Preamble

The House met at Half past Two o'Clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

BRITISH TRANSPORT COMMISSION BILL
(By Order)

Second Reading deferred till Thursday next at Seven o'clock.

ETON RURAL DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL
(By Order)

Second Reading deferred till Wednesday next.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE

Health Centres

Mr. Somerville Hastings: asked the Minister of Health (1) what arrangements he has made for practitioners who are willing to undertake full-time service in health centres in any part of the country to secure an opportunity to practise their profession in this way;
(2) what steps he takes to ensure agreement by suitable practitioners of a district to undertake service in a health centre before he sanctions the provision of such a centre by new construction or adaptation.

The Minister of Health (Mr. Aneurin Bevan): Before approving a health centre I obtain an assurance from the Executive Council, after consulting the local medical committee, either that enough local doctors want to practise there or that the need for more doctors in the area would justify advertising vacancies.

Mr. Hastings: With reference to the first Question, does not my right hon. Friend think that if he agreed to the arrangement suggested there it would greatly improve the distribution of doctors, which is most unequal at present?

Mr. Bevan: As my hon. Friend is probably aware, a special committee of the Central Health Services Cowed is exploring the whole question of the lines on which health centres should be developed.

Chemists (Payments)

Mr. Stanley Prescott: asked the Minister of Health what is the total sum under the National Health Scheme now outstanding to chemists; over what period such sum is owing; how many chemists are concerned; and why there is delay in settling accounts.

Mr. Bevan: About £3¼ million, representing balances due for the period August, 1949, to February, 1950, after substantial payments on account had been made to the 12,975 chemists concerned. The pricing staff have been unable to deal satisfactorily with the greatly increased number of prescriptions issued, but a new procedure has started which should lead to better progress.

Mr. Prescott: While thanking the right hon. Gentleman for that reply—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"]—because I think that it was factually accurate—may I ask whether he is aware that there is great hardship among chemists throughout the country because, during the last six months they have been financing the National Health Service? Will he do everything he can to expedite payment in future?

Mr. Bevan: We are doing all we can but, as I explained to the House when we discussed the Supplementary Estimates, there has been a very large increase indeed in the number of prescriptions. Ninety per cent. of the bills are paid within a month.

Mr. George Ward: asked the Minister of Health what steps he is taking to reduce the delay in payments to chemists.

Miss Irene Ward: asked the Minister of Health on what date he proposes to pay the outstanding claims due to the chemists in the Parliamentary constituency of Tynemouth

Mr. Bevan: Chemists including those in Tynemouth, are paid each month about 90 per cent. of the amount due for the preceding month. A new method


of pricing prescriptions, introduced recently, is expected to speed up the payment of balances.

Mr. Ward: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in Worcester chemists are experiencing delays of between three and eight months in some cases in receiving payment, and that at a recent meeting they resolved to make representations to the Minister which he should have had by now?

Mr. Bevan: Chemists have their own means of making representations to me. The arrears cannot be more than 10 per cent., as I have explained. Ninety per cent. of the amount due is paid within a month of it being due, so that the arrears are only 10 per cent.

Mr. De la Bère: South Worcestershire is not at all satisfied.

Miss Ward: As the Government are making money on the outstanding amounts due to chemists, will the right hon. Gentleman consider paying interest on the amounts which the Government owe to chemists?

Mr. Bevan: I am satisfied that chemists are adequately remunerated for the services they render.

Mr. Fernyhough: In view of the distressing financial circumstances of chemists, will my right hon. Friend consult with the Minister of National Insurance or the National Assistance Board with a view to giving favourable consideration to any application for help

Hospital Beds

Mr. Hastings: asked the Minister of Health what steps he is taking to prevent patients who have been informed that they will have to wait several months for a bed in hospital being admitted within a few days to Section V pay-bed in the same hospital if able to pay the doctor and hospital fees.

Mr. Bevan: If my hon. Friend will let me have particulars of any cases known to him, where admission was medically urgent and was refused, I shall be only too glad to look into them.

Mr. Hastings: But has not my right hon. Friend had many such cases brought to his notice during the last Parliament,

and does he not agree that it is unfair that there should be a restriction on general practitioners not to receive fees from their National Health Service cases when consultants are not restricted in that way?

Mr. Bevan: It is, of course, for those concerned with the administration of a hospital to deal with matters of this sort. Obviously, it is an abuse of the Act to deny admission to a patient who requires it on urgent medical grounds and then to admit the patient immediately because the surgeon can obtain a fee.

Kingston Hospital Committee (Appointments)

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Minister of Health why the chairman and three members of the Kingston Group Hospital Management Committee, whose names have been supplied to him, have not been re-appointed; and whether the decision not to re-appoint these persons was approved by him.

Mr. Bevan: The making of these appointments is a duty placed by Statute on the regional hospital boards, and no question of my approval arises.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Has the right hon. Gentleman investigated the many complaints that are now arising about the abuse of these powers by regional hospital boards, and in view of the fact—

Mr. Sydney Silverman: On a point of Order. Is it in Order, Mr. Speaker, for the hon. Member to proceed with this matter now in view of the fact that only last night, or in the early hours of yesterday morning, he pursued the matter in Debate in Committee of Supply and received a full answer from the Parliamentary Secretary?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Further to that point of Order. The hon. Gentleman is, of course, completely inaccurate in referring to the matter as being raised in a Debate in Committee of Supply. It was raised on the Adjournment, and I would respectfully submit, Mr. Speaker, that when an unsatisfactory answer is obtained, hon. Members are not inhibited thereby from pursuing their inquiry.

Mr. Bevan: As I have explained, this is a matter placed by Statute upon the regional hospital boards, and the House


must not complain about its own decisions.

Commander Noble: Is the Minister aware that there is a widespread feeling that there are some political backgrounds to these appointments, and will he give an undertaking that he will look into the matter?

Mr. Bevan: That is a point which I have not yet been able to establish, but many of my hon. Friends behind me have informed me that they are satisfied that, in some instances, Conservatives have been put on some of these committees.

Hospital Boards and Committees

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Minister of Health whether it is with his approval that paid servants of Regional Hospital Boards or Group Hospital Management Committees are appointed members of the particular boards or committees by whom they are employed.

Mr. Bevan: As a general principle, I am not in favour of these officers serving as members of the bodies with which they are immediately connected. The requirements of the Acts make it inevitable, how-fever, that a limited number of the senior medical and dental staffs should be so appointed, and I recognise that there may be other exceptional cases where it is desirable so to appoint officers.

Tuberculosis Cases

Mr. Scott: asked the Minister of Health if he will consider sending a proportion of tuberculosis cases to Continental sanatoria in order to relieve the waiting list for beds in this country.

Mr. Bevan: I have no power to do so. There is nothing in the National Health Service Act to empower the Minister or regional hospital boards to provide treatment abroad, or to contribute to the cost of it.

Mr. Gerald Williams: Is the Minister aware that it is only the slight cases which can at present get into hospitals and that more advanced cases, which have little hope of being cured, cannot get into any sanatorium? Would he take steps to see that they can be given this opportunity?

Mr. Bevan: I have no power to do it.

Mr. Williams: Will the right hon. Gentleman do something about it?

Injured Miners (Treatment)

Mr. Bartley: asked the Minister of Health to what extent he has given consideration to the recommendation contained in paragraph 182 of the annual report of the National Miners' Welfare Joint Council, 1948, of which a copy has been sent to him, in regard to the establishment of hospital facilities for the treatment of miners who are sufferers from complete paralysis of the lower limbs, resulting from injuries to the spinal cord.

Mr. Bevan: Steps are being taken to improve and extend the paraplegic unit at the Wharncliffe Hospital, Sheffield, and plans are being considered to develop the facilities at Southport and Stoke Mandeville, and to establish units in South Wales, Tyneside and London.

Prescriptions (Payment)

Mr. Douglas Houghton: asked the Minister of Health whether his regulations authorise a doctor in the National Health Service to tell a patient that he is forbidden to prescribe the drug he considers most suitable for treatment on the grounds of cost, but that he may prescribe it privately on payment.

Mr. Bevan: No, Sir. A general practitioner is required by his terms of service to prescribe such drugs as he thinks requisite for the treatment of any patient, but the cost of his prescribing should not exceed what is reasonably necessary for proper treatment.

Mr. Houghton: Will my right hon. Friend say what is the remedy of the patient if confronted with this situation?

Mr. Bevan: He has the remedy of changing his doctor.

Mr. Hastings: is it not illegal for a practitioner to give private treatment, for which he is paid, to one of his National Health Service patients?

Mr. Bevan: Yes, it is illegal.

Medical Services (Accounts)

Sir Waldron Smithers: asked the Minister of Health what was the total value of orders placed for medical services, drugs, prescriptions and equipment, and not yet paid for at the latest convenient available date.

Mr. Bevan: I regret that information is not available in the form requested. If the hon. Member will let me know more clearly what he has in mind, it may be possible to supply further information.

Sir W. Smithers: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, owing to State control and red tape, many of the biggest chemists are short of liquid funds, because the Government do not pay their bills, and that if a private person did that he would soon be at the Old Bailey?

Mr. Bevan: That is another question entirely. We have no evidence at all of chemists being unable to get the necessary stocks because they cannot afford them.

Mr. G. Williams: asked the Minister of Health the approximate sums of money due to doctors and others under the National Health Service

Mr. Bevan: The greater part of the remuneration of general practitioners is paid quarterly so that the amount due to them at any particular time varies between a full quarter's payment and practically nothing. The bills of dentists and opticians are met monthly but at varying dates. Chemists bills are similarly met monthly but only to the extent of 90 per cent., the balance for that and previous months being paid as and when pricing is completed.

Mr. Williams: Will the Minister say why there have been so many complaints from chemists in my own constituency, who have lost sums of money owing to them by the Government and which is causing them great hardship?

Mr. Bevan: We have not received representations from chemists' organisations that bear out that complaint, but I will certainly make further inquiries.

Mr. Prescott: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that some chemists have gone into liquidation because they cannot continue to finance the National Health scheme? Will he give his attention to that matter?

Mr. Bevan: If the hon. Gentleman will give the names of the chemists concerned I will make inquiries.

Hospital Securities (Sale)

Mr. Keeling: asked the Minister of Health how much he has realised by the sale of hospital securities; and whether the selling of them has been completed

Mr. Bevan: The sum of £1,614,499 has been realised by the sale of hospital securities included in the Hospital Endowments Fund. Further sales, amounting to approximately £1,250,000, will be completed before the end of the financial year.

Mr. Keeling: Does that complete everything?

Mr. Bevan: I am not quite sure, but I think it does.

Maternity Accommodation, Cornwall

Sir Harold Roper: asked the Minister of Health if he is aware of the shortage of accommodation for maternity cases in North Cornwall; and if he will take steps to remedy the situation with the least possible delay

Mr. Bevan: I am informed that the regional hospital board are already taking steps to increase the accommodation available.

Sir H. Roper: Will the right hon. Gentleman please give details of the steps the Government propose to take?

Mr. Bevan: I will send them to the hon. Gentleman.

Hospital Glassware

Mr. John Grimston: asked the Minister of Health what was the landed duty paid value of hospital glassware imported for his Department from Germany; the rate of duty paid; and the saving made compared with the prices for the same ware made at home

Sir H. Williams: asked the Minister of Health in respect of what categories of glassware his Department have had difficulty in obtaining satisfactory tenders from British manufacturers

Mr. Keeling: asked the Minister of Health for what kinds of glassware for hospitals British manufacturers have tendered; for what kinds no tenders were received; and the approximate value of the annual requirements in each category

Mr. Bevan: I understand that the agreements between manufacturers and distributors of furnace-blown and pressed laboratory glass preclude manufacturers from tendering for Government bulk requirements of beakers, flasks and heavy chemical glassware. The total hospital needs are estimated at £15,000 a year, of which only one-third can be obtained under direct contracts with manufacturers. The landed duty paid value of glassware recently imported from Germany was £2,765, the rate of duty paid being 33 per cent. This purchase represents a saving varying between 10 per cent. and 30 per cent. compared with prices for the same sizes and types of British glassware.

Mr. Grimston: Is the Minister aware that this is a trifling saving but that, nevertheless, there is a dollar component in these purchases and that if this glassware had been purchased at home he would have saved that number of dollars?

Mr. Bevan: No; I think the hon. Gentleman is inaccurate in this matter. The reason why we went to Germany was because of an arrangement made between retailers and manufacturers of these articles by which retailers alone were allowed to tender, and that is the reason why this saving has been made. I have, however, now asked British manufacturers to tender again, and I hope that their conduct in future will be better than it has been in the past.

Mr. Keeling: Is the Minister aware that his statement, on 14th March, that retailers had been asked to tender, was wrong? They were not asked. Is he aware that, by his own showing, he was also wrong in saying that there was a large saving by buying in Germany? Is he further aware that, by buying in Germany, he went against the advice of a Government Committee which said that this laboratory glassware was a key industry which should be maintained in this country at all hazards?

Mr. Bevan: If we saved from 10 to 30 per cent. after paying 33⅓ per cent. duty on glassware surely an excessive price was being charged to British users. If this industry is necessary, as it is, for the welfare of Great Britain, that situation ought not to be exploited by the industry itself.

Mr. Emrys Roberts: Will the Minister refer this arrangement between the glass

manufacturers and the retailers to the Monopolies and Restrictive Practices Commission?

Mr. Bevan: I am considering it, but I hope that the steps I have already taken will improve their conduct.

Captain Crookshank: Will the Minister drop the use of the term "percentage" and say how much money was saved?

Mr. Bevan: No; I am not prepared to give manufacturers at this stage, when we are still asking for tenders, the precise information.

Captain Crookshank: Would it be about £3,000?

Mr. Bevan: No, it may be a lot more, but I am not prepared, when we are buying this material, to give tenderers information to enable them to fix prices.

Mr. Grimston: Is there not, in fact, a dollar component in these purchases, and would not the Minister have saved a number of dollars if he had bought these wares in this country?

Mr. Bevan: If the hon. Gentleman would give me information as to what is the dollar content I will try to have it inquired into.

Mr. Grimston: Ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Later

Sir H. Williams: On a point of Order. Question No. 26 was not called.

Mr. Speaker: Questions Nos. 24, 26 and 29 were answered together. I was looking at the hon. Member, thinking that he might ask a supplementary question, but he did not rise.

Sir H. Williams: The Question was not answered at all. I asked the Minister of Health:
in respect of what categories of glassware his Department have had difficulty in obtaining satisfactory tenders from British manufacturers.

Mr. Speaker: We have passed that Question. The hon. Member cannot ask it again.

Deaf Aids

Mr. Erroll: asked the Minister of Health what evidence is available as to


the percentage of deaf people who continue to use their Medresco hearing aids after an initial period of six months.

Mr. Bevan: Information is not available at present, but I am already taking steps to get it.

Mr. Erroll: Will the Minister examine the falling off in demand for replacement batteries, which appears to indicate the reduced usage of these aids?

Mr. Bevan: As the hon. Gentleman is aware, it very often happens that deaf people, having acquired hearing aids—either the Medresco aid or private aids—give them up in despair because they do not like to use them too long. We are making investigations to ascertain whether there is any wastage.

Mental Patients

Mr. Janner: asked the Minister of Health if he will give any information about the practice of some institutions which look after mentally defective girls of allowing them to take jobs of daily service; and what safeguards are taken by these institutions to ensure that the homes in which the girls work are of a respectable type.

Mr. Bevan: It has been the practice in mental deficiency hospitals to grant suitable patients licence on trial or leave of absence to daily situations. It is a valuable method of ascertaining the fitness of patients to return to community life. No patient is granted this until the superintendent and the hospital management committee are satisfied as to the suitability of the place to which the patient is going. Thereafter, the patient is visited by the social worker from the hospital or by an officer of the local health authority, and reports are furnished to the committee of management of the hospital.

Mr. Janner: While thanking my right hon. Friend for his reply, may I ask him whether, in view of the fact that there have been some cases in which the proportions have not been sufficient for the purpose, he will inquire into those cases and see that these matters are dealt with to his complete satisfaction?

Mr. Bevan: I will certainly make inquiries into any instances which my hon. Friend may bring to my notice.

Adoption Orders

Mr. Michael Astor: asked the Minister of Health how many complaints he has had from parents of adopted children making claims under the National Health Service on the need for producing adoption orders in order to comply with regulations.

Mr. Bevan: If the hon. Member will let me know what he has in mind I will look into it.

Mr. Astor: Is the Minister aware that in small communities indiscretions concerning secrecy are almost inevitable and cause considerable embarrassment to parents of adopted children? Would the Minister try to devise some scheme whereby the production of a birth certificate instead of an adoption order meets all the requirements?

Mr. Bevan: I think the hon. Member will find that the requirements are already met. I will certainly make inquiries to see if there is any removable embarrassment.

Mr. Astor: I will communicate with the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Bevan: Thank you.

Spectacles

Mr. John E. Haire: asked the Minister of Health what is the present delay in the supply of spectacles under the National Health Service; and when it is hoped to overtake the demand.

Mr. Sutcliffe: asked the Minister of Health what progress has been made in the reduction of the waiting period for spectacles, as compared with six months ago

Mr. Bevan: The average delay is now a little over four months, compared with some six months last autumn, and is rapidly decreasing. Supply has exceeded demand for some months and the greater part of the arrears should be overtaken before the end of the year.

Mr. Haire: While appreciating the improvement, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he is aware that the delay in the case of children is still distressingly long? Would my right hon. Friend urge


opticians to establish some measure of priority for children, because of their rapidly changing eyesight?

Mr. Bevan: I asked opticians many months ago to give priority to children and sick people.

Mr. McAdden: asked the Minister of Health when Miss Palmer, 7, Bournemouth Park Road, Southend-on-Sea, is likely to receive the pair of spectacles ordered by her on 3rd June, 1949, under the National Health Scheme, through Mr. Vennall, optician, Southchurch Road, Southend, against prescription No. D. 1022.

Mr. Bevan: Soon, I hope. I understand there was no case for any priority here.

Mr. McAdden: Although there is no question of priority here, according to the Minister, will he remember that quite a short while ago the delay was four months whereas this lady has been waiting for 10 months? Is there any chance of her getting them before the next General Election?

Mr. Bevan: The period of delay is now rapidly decreasing.

Mr. Keeling: Will the Minister give an assurance that any ginger he proposes to apply to the supply of spectacles to Southend-on-Sea will not slow down the rate of production for Twickenham-on-Thames?

Mental Hospitals (Staffing)

Mr. Basil Nield: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware of the shortage of staff in mental hospitals; and what proposals he has for encouraging recruitment in this service.

Mr. Bevan: I am well aware of it, and I presume that the hon. Member is referring mainly to nursing staff. A revision of salary scales has been agreed, and continuous efforts are made to bring the needs and advantages of this Service to the notice of likely recruits. My Advisory Committee is giving close attention to this matter at the present time.

Mr. Nield: Can the right hon. Gentleman hold out any hope of an improvement in pay and conditions reasonably soon, so as to tend to relieve the situation?

Mr. Bevan: The salary scale has been agreed.

Nurses (Salary Scales)

Mr. J. N. Browne: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware of the concern in the nursing profession and the effect on recruitment caused by the delay in the publication of new salary scales; and whether he will allay this concern by giving an assurance that all grades will be dealt with; and if he will make a statement on the extent to which all new revised scales will be retrospective.

Mr. Bevan: These are all matters for the negotiating machinery in the first instance. The salaries of some of the senior hospital grades are before the Whitley Council. Those of the public health and domiciliary grades have been referred to arbitration.

Mr. Browne: Is the Minister aware that all that is required to cure the deep apprehension in the nursing profession is the simple assurance that all grades will be dealt with and that all pay improvements will be restrospective to 1st February, 1949?

Mr. Bevan: I respectfully suggest to the hon. Gentleman that it is far better to leave these matters to the Whitley machinery.

Brigadier Peto: Will the Minister say whether the new scales will include the midwives' profession.

Mr. Bevan: I think, as I suggested, that it would be very much better if these matters were left in the first instance to the Whitley machinery.

Mrs. Hill: May I ask the Minister, in view of the fact that he has so much power and that the Health Service is within his control, whether he will urge the Whitley Council to get down to this question of the new salary scales? It is a fact that some of the Departments—[HON. MEMBERS: "Speech."]—I want the Minister to know that the Departments—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Well, will the Minister please give me some satisfaction?

Mr. Bevan: I realise that the hon. Lady has not had much experience of the House, but as a general rule it is just as well that these matters of negotiating


scales of salaries and conditions should be left to the appropriate organisation. The less the Minister interferes the better.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING

Requirements

Mr. Black: asked the Minister of Health if he will give an estimate of how many new houses would need to be built to enable every family in Great Britain to have a separate house; and how long the building of such new houses would take at the present rate of progress.

Mr. Bevan: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply given on 9th March to questions by the hon. Member for Tynemouth (Miss Irene Ward) and other hon. Members.

Miss Irene Ward: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that he did not give any answer on that occasion?

Mr. Bevan: It is quite clear that it would only be possible to answer a question upon these lines if a house to house survey were made of the whole country.

Mrs. Jean Mann: Does not my right hon. Friend agree that it would not be possible, even on a house to house survey, to get an accurate estimate without knowing how many young men intend to propose to how many young women in the next week or the next month? Any forecast would be completely inadequate.

Huts, Colchester

Mr. Alport: asked the Minister of Health whether he is satisfied with the standard of accommodation of the Service hutments now used by civilian families around Colchester; and what action he intends to take to assist in securing decent homes for the families concerned, promised to them at various intervals during the last five years.

Mr. Bevan: The general standard of accommodation in these hutments is as good as can be provided in such buildings. But in two groups where there have been complaints of condensation, the local authorities are doing all they can to remedy it. The continued use of this type of accommodation must clearly depend on housing progress in the particular area.

Major Tufton Beamish: To what extent does the Minister think that people who are living in such shocking conditions—for example, in Rushey Hill Camp, in my constituency—are comforted by the knowledge that the huts in which they live are described as "new homes" in his party's propaganda?

Mr. Bevan: The hon. and gallant Member is entirely inaccurate. The housing figures of new accommodation do not include hutments or Service camps.

Mr. Martin Lindsay: Can the Minister give an assurance that there will be no, housing problem by the time the next General Election takes place?

Mr. Bevan: The Opposition can rest content that we will never again accept any Conservative figures about housing

Farm Workers' Cottages

Brigadier Rayner: asked the Minister of Health what progress he has made under the Housing Act, 1949, with the reconditioning of farm workers' cottages.

Brigadier Medlicott: asked the Minister of Health how many farm workers' cottages in England and Wales have been reconditioned under the Housing Act, 1949; and how many of such cottages are situate in the County of Norfolk.

Mr. Bevan: Many local authorities, including rural district councils, are considering schemes under Part II of the. Housing Act, 1949, but specific information about farm workers' cottages is not available.

Brigadier Rayner: Is the right hon. Gentleman yet willing to admit that tens of thousands of agricultural workers would be much better housed today if he had not scrapped the Housing (Agricultural Workers) Act, 1938?

Mr. Bevan: Very large numbers of agricultural workers who now occupy new houses would not be in them if the materials and labour used to build them had been expended in the way the hon. and gallant Member desired.

Mr. Baldwin: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that the necessary increase of agricultural production is impossible unless licences are


granted for the private building of farm workers' houses to be let at rents they can afford; and what steps he proposes to take to overcome this shortage.

Mr. Bevan: Priority has for some time been given to agricultural housing, and local authorities have already built large numbers of houses for letting at rents which agricultural workers can afford. I cannot, therefore, accept the implications in this Question.

Mr. Baldwin: Is the Minister aware that if he examines the matter again he will find that the rural houses he brags about are being offered at rents that farm labourers cannot afford—in some cases, in my constituency, at 30s. a week?

Mr. Bevan: If the hon. Gentleman will give me information I will have the matter inquired into, and also the character of the council concerned.

Mr. Baldwin: Does not the Minister know that I have already given that information in a Debate, about 18 months ago?

Mr. Bevan: The hon. Gentleman then advanced a large number of opinions which were at variance with the facts.

Building Licences

Brigadier Peto: asked the Minister of Health why it is necessary for a local authority to surrender one of its quota of licences for permanent houses where application is granted for the adaptation of a hut or pavilion purchased privately and off licence, before the applicant can erect or adapt the hut as a temporary dwelling instead of coming out of the permissible ceiling allocation of money for repairs, conversions and provision of additional housing, provided that the architectural plan has been approved by the appropriate authority.

Mr. Bevan: It is not necessary for a local authority to use of its quota of licences for permanent houses. Where a structure is approved by the planning authority for use as a temporary dwelling and conforms with the local by-laws, the local authority may issue the necessary building licence out of their permissible ceiling for repairs and the like.

Brigadier Peto: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that the housing authorities in Bristol are informed of this because, at the moment, they are not aware of it?

Mr. Bevan: I should be astonished if they were not aware of it.

Rent Appeals

Sir Wavell Wakefield: asked the Minister of Health what steps he proposes to take to have defined more clearly what is a fair rent for the guidance of rent tribunals and the law courts; and when does he propose to widen the appeal allowed to a divisional court against rent tribunal decisions from the one issue of jurisdiction to all issues.

Mr. Bevan: I do not propose to introduce the legislation which would be needed.

Sir W. Wakefield: Is the Minister aware that the Lord Chief Justice has stated that it is most unsatisfactory that there is no proper definition of a fair rent, and has also commented on the narrowness of the right of appeal? In view of that statement, and of experience gained in the working of the Act, will not the right hon. Gentleman reconsider the decision?

Mr. Bevan: I have not seen the statement alleged to have been made by the Lord Chief Justice, but the House is master of its own legislation.

Mr. Derek Walker-Smith: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is no right of appeal at all, and that the divisional court intervenes only in questions of jurisdiction? Does he agree that in view of the very large number of cases in which they have quashed the findings there ought to be a right of appeal?

Mr. Bevan: This matter was very fully discussed by the House when the Bill was before it. The House has taken its decision on the matter and, until it varies it, that decision will stand.

Mr. S. Silverman: In view of the reference to the Lord Chief Justice, will the Minister consider the advisability of sending him a copy of the proceedings of this House, in which the matter was debated at great length, so that he may be aware of the reasons that led to the legislation?

Mr. Bevan: I shall certainly find out what the Lord Chief Justice has said on this matter and acquaint him with the facts.

Local Authorities (Allocations)

Miss Irene Ward: asked the Minister of Health which of the following local authorities have had allocations of houses which they cannot build: Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Cardiff, Coventry. Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Nottingham, Plymouth. Sheffield, Southampton, Wallsend-on-Tyne, Whitehaven, Wolverhampton. Tynemouth and Whitley Bay.

Mr. Bevan: It is not possible to obtain information in the form asked for in the Question. Allocations are made to local authorities from time to time and are based upon an estimate of what each local authority is able to build within the resources available. The rate of actual building progress which is made on houses allocated to an authority is one of the factors taken into account when the next allocation is made.

Miss Ward: In the light of that information, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the advisability, when answering supplementary questions in future, of not trying to bowl "fast ones"?

Mr. Bevan: Is there any objection to bowling "slow ones"?

Census

Mr. Fort: asked the Minister of Health whether the Registrar-General is preparing to carry out in 1951 a census of the population of the United Kingdom; and whether a census of housing will be carried out simultaneously as was done in the 1931 census

Mr. Bevan: The Registrar-General is making preparations for the next census which falls due in the normal course in 1951, and is in touch with the Ministries of Health and Town and Country Planning as to the information on housing that can conveniently be obtained through the census.

Mr. Fort: Will the right hon. Gentleman make sure that the Registrar-General includes the information needed to answer Question No. 2?

Mr. Bevan: No, it would not be possible to obtain such detailed information as that for the census.

Property Values

Mr. Spearman: asked the Minister of Health if he will enable local authorities to purchase property at current market values, as under his present regulations they are unable to obtain the necessary premises

Mr. Bevan: The basis of compensation on compulsory purchase was laid down by Parliament in the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947, and it is essential that local authorities should not pay more than this basis allows, as otherwise the purpose of the Act may be defeated.

Mr. Spearman: Does not the right hon. Gentleman think that it would be in the public interest if he recognised the change in market values, which has largely come about through the inflationary policy of this Government?

Mr. Bevan: It certainly would not help the Exchequer if they paid far more money than was necessary for the property.

Haig Homes, Cardiff

Mr. George Thomas: asked the Minister of Health the reasons for the delay in building the Haig homes for disabled ex-Service men in Cardiff

Mr. Bevan: I understand that delay was caused by the decision of the trustees of Haig homes to reduce the number of houses at Rumney from 32 to 16 which necessitated reconsideration of the site, but that they have now been authorised by the local authority to proceed.

Oral Answers to Questions — WATER SUPPLIES

Aust, Gloucestershire

Mr. Perkins: asked the Minister of Health (1) when he anticipates that a main water supply will be available for the Parish of Aust, Gloucestershire;
(2) whether he is satisfied that there is no danger to health from the contaminated wells which supply water to the people of Aust; and whether each well will be tested by his Department

Mr. Bevan: I have had no recent complaints about the condition of the wells in Aust, but a piped supply is undoubtedly needed. The area is within the limits of supply of a water company and I have approved a scheme for the extension of their mains to serve the area and the payment by the rural district council of a substantial part of the cost. I cannot say when the supply will be available because the company cannot supply without a new source and the procedure for obtaining the necessary water rights may be lengthy.

Congleton

Air-Commodore Harvey: asked the Minister of Health if he will now give a decision regarding the third contract in connection with the Hug Bridge Water Supply, Congleton, Cheshire, details of which have already been sent him

Mr. Bevan: The Congleton Borough Council have been authorised to accept a tender for this contract.

Air-Commodore Harvey: Can the Minister say why this matter has been pending for nearly eight months? Had he authorised the pipes last summer he would now have the water.

Mr. Bevan: It is necessary always to consider starting dates for these schemes; otherwise, they would jostle each other out of existence.

Air-Commodore Harvey: Is the Minister aware that other parts of the contract have been completed, except for the pipes. which are eight months late?

Mr. Bevan: That is the reason. If all these schemes started simultaneously they would impede the progress of each other.

Rural Areas

Mr. Profumo: asked the Minister of Health what proportion of the £15,000,000 granted under the Rural Water Supplies and Sewerage Act, 1944, has so far been allocated to local authorities towards the capital cost of providing piped water supplies in rural areas; and whether he will make more speedy use of the remainder of this sum for these purposes

Mr. Bevan: I have allocated grants amounting to £5,709,000 towards the cost of providing piped water supplies in rural areas, and £4,130,000 for sewerage and

sewage disposal. Applications for grant in aid of further schemes estimated to cost £16,846,000 have been submitted and will be dealt with as soon as possible.

Mr. Profumo: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that his answer is a rather poor commentary on the achievements of the Government in this very vital field? Is he further aware that if he could persuade his colleagues not to export so many pipes he might be able to get more speedy financial help to enable this important work to be carried out?

Mr. Bevan: The achievements of the Government in this field in the last 4½ years compare very favourably with those of the previous 30 years.

Squadron-Leader A. E. Cooper: Is the Minister aware that the information he has given to the House is not in accordance with information recently given to the House by the Minister of Agriculture?

Mr. Turton: Can the Minister say what proportion of this grant has actually been paid to the local authorities?

Mr. Bevan: Not without notice.

Oral Answers to Questions — AMBULANCE OFFICER, BEDFORD (CAR)

Mr. Moeran: asked the Minister of Health on what grounds an ambulance belonging to the local authority in Bedford was used for the purpose of transporting Mr. House, of 2, Wendover Drive, Bedford, to a polling station on 23rd February, 1950; who gave permission for this public service vehicle in charge of a uniformed driver to be so employed; and what action he proposes for dealing with this irregularity

Mr. Bevan: I have made inquiries, and I am informed that the vehicle was a private car belonging to the ambulance station officer, and that, although in uniform at the time, the officer was, in fact, not on duty.

Mr. Moeran: Having regard to the ownership of the ambulance, will the right hon. Gentleman inquire as to its use, and permission for its use, with his customary zeal and energy?

Mr. Bevan: I have made inquiries into this matter, and, as I say, it was a private car and not an ambulance.

Captain Soames: Would the Minister try to persuade his hon. Friend to apologise to the public body against whom he has levelled this false and serious accusation?

Mr. Lennox-Boyd: May I, Mr. Speaker, ask your advice on this problem? Is it not a fact that this Question says that the car was an ambulance owned by a local authority, that this statement is quite untrue, and should not hon. Members be careful not to ask Questions based on information which is quite false and largely, if not entirely, tendered because they dislike the result of elections in neighbouring constituencies?

Mr. Speaker: It is not a matter for me. Every Member is responsible for what he puts down, and if it is in order it has to go on the Paper.

Sir H. Williams: If the hon. Member is responsible, what is the sanction on him if he is wrong?

Oral Answers to Questions — SEWERAGE SCHEME, LLANGOLLEN

Mr. J. Grimston: asked the Minister of Health what steps he is taking to stop the discharge of untreated sewage in the River Dee at Llangollen

Mr. Bevan: A scheme to provide treat-bent for the sewage is in preparation by the Llangollen Urban District Council. who are the local authority concerned. I hope to be able to approve it shortly.

Oral Answers to Questions — HERTFORDSHIRE (POPULATION)

Mr. Maudling: asked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been called to a recent speech, of which a copy has been sent to him, by the chairman of the Finance Committee of the Hertford County Council, stressing the financial burden caused to the county by the prospective influx of an additional population of 200,000; and what steps he proposes to take to assist the County Council in meeting this burden

Mr. Bevan: I have noted these observations. It is to be assumed that an influx of population will bring added rating resources. But if these do not suffice to prevent the county figure falling

below the average of the whole country, and in so far as the expenditure is not met by other grants, the County Council will be entitled to an equalisation grant.

Mr. Maudling: While thanking the Minister for that reply, may I ask him to bear in mind that the Hertfordshire County Council is involved in considerable expense in preparing for this influx of population in advance of the creation of any additional rateable value?

Mr. Bevan: That happens to every local authority when there is a local influx of population.

Oral Answers to Questions — PARK HOTEL, PRESTON

Mr. Julian Amery: asked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the great shortage of hotel accommodation in Preston, he will take steps to prevent the Park Hotel being taken over by the Lancashire County Council to be used as offices

Mr. Bevan: I may have to decide an appeal if consent is refused under Defence Regulation 68CA to the change of use, so I cannot prejudge the matter now.

Oral Answers to Questions — FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN

Mr. John E. Haire: asked the Lord President of the Council what progress has been made by local authorities in preparation for the Festival of Britain

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): Of the 1,532 local authorities in England and Wales 645 have shown interest in the Festival of Britain to date. Of these 178 have sent in information about their programmes of Festival activities. These figures do not include 141 parish councils which are also interested. I am unable to give figures for Scotland. This is quite a good beginning, but I hope that many more local authorities and other bodies will start planning for the Festival soon as time for preparation is getting short.

Mr. Haire: Will my right hon. Friend continue to impress on those local authorities who are still back-sliding that this is an important national occasion? Will


he do everything he can to get a truly united front?

Mr. Morrison: Yes, Sir. I will do my best, but on the whole there is a lot to be said for treating local authorities with that full care and respect which is due to them.

Squadron-Leader A. E. Cooper: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that many local authorities in this country feel that the manpower and raw materials used in the Festival of Britain would be much better used in building houses for the people?

Hon. Members: Hear, hear.

Mr. Morrison: I do not know what that noise from the Opposition is about, because they have acquiesced in this Festival as we have gone along. My impression is that local authorities are taking a rather broader view of the needs of the country than is the hon. and gallant Member opposite.

Sir Austin Hudson: asked the Lord President of the Council whether, in view of the urgent need for all building operatives to concentrate on building houses, he will postpone the Festival of Britain from 1951 to a later date

Mr. H. Morrison: No, Sir.

Sir A. Hudson: Is the Minister aware that if the energy which had been expended in trying to finish this Exhibition in time were expended on building more houses it would much improve the housing situation in London?

Mr. Morrison: If I may say so, that is a very partisan observation. It is, of course, possible to advance the view that every piece of building other than working-class housing should be stopped, and there is something to be said for it. That is to say, that repairs and reconditioning of the houses of the rich, cinemas and anything else should all be stopped and that industrial building should all be stopped. If the hon. Member wants to advance the theory that everything in the building line other than direct municipal building should be stopped, let him say so.

Commander Galbraith: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that the policy of the Government is to build for need and not for class?

Mr. Morrison: I have said what I have said. In the meantime, all Parliamentary parties in the House are represented on the Festival of Britain. We debated this matter earlier and there was general agreement, and I think it is a pity if this partisan shooting is to begin in spite of the agreement.

Sir A. Hudson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that when this scheme was first mooted we were told that the number of building operatives to be employed on it would be so small that if they were employed on housing it would make no difference? That does not appear to be the case, however, and many of us are genuinely alarmed, particularly in view of the cut in housing.

Mr. Morrison: It will not really make all that difference, so as to involve a dramatic issue. Our country really must exhibit itself to the world as a progressive country which has achieved things. There are great economic advantages, direct and indirect, from the Festival of Britain and I would urge hon. Members opposite not to make this a partisan issue but to think of the broad issues of the country as a whole.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE

Oxfordshire County Committee (Staff)

Mr. John Hay: asked the Minister of Agriculture how many salaried officers of all grades are employed by the Oxfordshire Agricultural Executive Committee including officers of the National Agricultural Advisory Service; and what is the total amount paid by the Oxfordshire Agricultural Executive Committee for wages and salaries

The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Thomas Williams): The salaried staff of the Oxfordshire Agricultural Executive Committee numbers 131 (including six part-time). Their salaries and wages amount to approximately £41,000 per annum.

Mr. Hay: Is the right hon. Gentleman satisfied that all these people are fully and productively employed at this tremendous cost?

Mr. Williams: Yes, and I think it is a fine national investment, as increased production has shown.

Livestock (Damage by Dogs)

Captain Duncan: asked the Minister of Agriculture how many sheep, lambs and poultry in England and Wales have been reported to him as having been killed or damaged by dogs in the years 1947, 1948 and 1949; and if he will give an aproximate estimate of their value

Mr. T. Williams: My Department does not receive regular reports on the subject, and the information which reaches the Department is not sufficiently comprehensive or representative to give an indication of the position throughout the country or to enable me to make any estimate of losses.

Horses (Export and Slaughter)

Mr. George Jeger: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he proposes to accept the recommendations of the Departmental Committee on Export and Slaughter of Horses, and in particular whether he will make an order raising the values below which no horse should be allowed to be exported

Mr. H. A. Price: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he is aware of the illegal traffic in horses which is rampant throughout the country; and what steps he proposes to take in this matter

Mr. Slater: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he is aware of the anxiety that exists about the export of horses to the Continent for slaughter; and if he will bring in legislation to prohibit this

Mr. T. Williams: The Government are considering the Report of the Committee on the Traffic in Horses for Export and for Slaughter for Home Consumption, and I hope to be able to make a statement at an early date. In the meantime, the present ban on the export of horses for slaughter is being continued.

Open-cast Mining, Flintshire

Mrs. Eirene White: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will take steps to protect the farmers of East Flintshire who are now threatened with the development of open-cast coal-mining

Mr. T Williams: Before any farmland is requisitioned for open-cast coal-mining I am consulted by my right hon. Friend, the Minister of Fuel and Power, so that I may examine the agricultural implications of the proposal. My hon. Friend

may rest assured that the interests of farmers in her constituency whose land is affected will receive the most careful consideration.

Mrs. White: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in this neighbourhood a large amount of land is being taken for extensive housing, for a large technical college and for other purposes? Will he bear all this in mind?

Mr. Williams: Certainly.

Potatoes

Mr. Osborne: asked the Minister of Agriculture how many acres of potatoes were under cultivation when potato rationing was ended in 1948; and what is the corresponding figure today

Mr. T. Williams: The 1948 potato acreage in the United Kingdom was 1,548,000 acres. For 1950 we are aiming at an acreage of 1,300,000 acres.

Mr. Osborne: Is the Minister satisfied that in view of the fact that potato consumption has gone up by 12 per cent. since potato rationing ended the acreage will now fulfil the requirements of the nation?

Mr. Williams: Yes, Sir, with anything like normal yields I estimate it will be sufficient.

Tractors

Mr. Hurd: asked the Minister of Agriculture the numbers of agricultural tractors on farms in the United Kingdom in 1939 and at the present time

Mr. T. Williams: It is estimated that in 1939 there were about 55,000 agricultural tractors in use in the United Kingdom. According to census returns, there were about 245,000 in January, 1948. A further census has just been taken and up-to-date figures should be available in a few weeks. The best estimate that can be given in the meantime is that there are about 300,000 in use at present.

Mr. Hurd: Will the Minister give the House an assurance that his Department has now made up its mind about the number of tractors, because in the Debate on the Address the Parliamentary Secretary gave a very different figure?

Mr. Williams: That was unfortunately due to a clerical error.

Marginal Land

Sir Ian Fraser: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he will now make a statement on the Government's policy as to the better use of marginal land

Mr. T. Williams: As my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary stated in the Debate on the Address on 8th March, an examination is being undertaken of the whole problem of the improvement of marginal land, but I am not yet in a position to make any further statement.

Sir I. Fraser: Could the right hon. Gentleman put in a White Paper or some other document the facts as regards the areas, and the definitions to be used, and which are within the knowledge of his Department, so that this matter may be considered by an informed House?

Mr. Williams: I shall be answering a Question on that later.

Brigadier Medlicott: asked the Minister of Agriculture what is the estimated acreage in England and Wales of land generally described as marginal; and the Government's policy on the development and better use of such land

Mr. Hugh Fraser: asked the Minister of Agriculture, whether, in view of the Government's pledge to make and encourage fuller use of marginal land, he will now order a survey to be made of land suitable for development and not at present in production

Mr. T. Williams: The acreage of marginal land depends on how the term is defined. Very roughly, I estimate that in England and Wales there are about three million acres of land which is used, or could at reasonable cost be made suitable for use, for the breeding or rearing of cattle or sheep, and which is not suited for the production to any material extent of milk, fatstock or crops for sale. As my bon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary stated in the Debate on the Address on 8th March a survey is being undertaken of the possibility of further measures for the improvement of such marginal land, but I am not yet in a position to say what the outcome may be.

Captain Duncan: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by "reasonable cost"?

Mr. Williams: Reasonable cost.

Captain. Duncan: But what does it mean?

Mr. Williams: It means—well, reasonable cost.

Sir I. Fraser: Will the right hon. Gentleman, in view of his promise when answering Question 55, now answer my supplementary question and give all the facts?

Mr. Williams: Yes, when the facts are made available to me by the committee that has been investigating this matter for weeks.

Mr. Vane: By whom has this survey been carried out?

Mr. Williams: By civil servants plus a certain number of scientists.

Mr. H. Fraser: Will the right hon. Gentleman make it clearer who are the experts involved, and will he tell the House if he is in touch with the National Farmers' Union, which is making a survey at the moment?

Mr. Williams: If the hon. Gentleman had been in his place one day last week he would have known that I gave the answer to the question he now puts.

Mr. Fraser: The right hon. Gentleman did not give a list of the officials concerned or the experts.

Mr. Williams: I did not give the names of the civil servants, but I did give the names of the scientists.

New Price Schedules

Sir I. Fraser: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he will now say when the February review of prices will be completed and announced

Mr. Hurd: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he can now announce the results of the February price review

Mr. T. Williams: With permission will answer by making a statement at the end of Questions.

At the end of Questions:

Mr. T. Williams: In accordance with Section 2 of the Agriculture Act, 1947, the Agriculture Ministers have, in consultation with the National Farmers' Unions of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, undertaken a review of the general economic condition and prospects of the agricultural industry. Among the matters


which have been considered are the already announced increases in prices of feedingstuffs as from 1st April and of fertilisers from 1st July. These and other additional costs of production have been considered in relation to the statistics of aggregate farmers' net incomes, as published annually in the White Paper on National Income and Expenditure. The whole review has taken place against the background of the national economic position.
The conclusions which the Government have reached in the light of the review tall into three parts:
First, increases are to be made in the prices for milk, fat cattle, fat sheep and fat pigs, with effect roughly from 1st April, 1950. Acreage payments for potatoes and rye will be discontinued as from and including the 1951 harvest, but there will be price increases for main crop and second early ware potatoes. Prices of the other principal crops will not be increased.
Second, from 1st July, 1950, schemes will operate in the United Kingdom to assist farmers in the purchase of fertilisers used for improving grassland and marginal land.
Third, there will be extensions in the near future to the marginal production schemes in England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, for the purpose of assisting certain classes of the smaller producers of milk, pigs and eggs in respect of their purchases of feedingstuffs, and partly to speed up the rehabilitation of semi-derelict land and other similar activities eligible under the existing marginal production schemes.
The cost of these new or extended improvement grants will in a full year be approximately £7 million. They therefore constitute a major element in the Government's decisions arising from the price review. The leaders of the National Farmers' Unions have indicated their acceptance of these decisions both general and in relation to the separate components which I have outlined. Their concurrence is prompted by a desire to avoid an undue rise in prices to the consumer and to concentrate a substantial part of the relief from additional costs on those farmers most in need of assistance.
The Agriculture Act, 1947, also requires Ministers to determine and announce during 1950 minimum prices for milk, fatstock and eggs in 1952–53 and 1953–54, but by agreement with the Farmers' Unions consideration of this subject has been deferred on the understanding that decisions will be reached within the next two months.
I am circulating with this answer a statement giving the main features of the new price schedules and an outline of the proposals for assisting the purchase of fertilisers and extending the marginal production schemes.

Mr. Hurd: Will the Minister tell the House the sum involved in the elimination of the foodstuffs subsidy, how much of this will fall to be borne by the farmers without recompense and how much will be borne by the housewives in higher prices of milk, eggs and other livestock products?

Mr. Williams: I think that the hon. Gentleman would do well to read the statement and the schedule of new prices, now available in the Vote Office.

Sir I. Fraser: Do the prices which will be disclosed when we read the OFFICIAL REPORT take into account the rise in production which has followed devaluation and the prospective rise in the cost of freights?

Mr. Williams: No, Sir.

Major Sir Thomas Dugdale: I think we all agree that before we can pass judgment on the schedule of prices they will have to undergo careful examination by Members in all parts of the House. I would like to ask the Minister one or two questions on this statement: first, who will pay for the increased charges that he has announced in general terms today; second, is he satisfied that the position of producers who cannot grow their own foodstuffs has been amply safeguarded, with particular reference to such specialised producers as poultry producers? As to the announcement of the Minister about the marginal production schemes, is the House to assume that his statement takes no account of the wider schemes for marginal land which were referred to in the Gracious Speech? Can the Minister also say whether the £7 million to which he has referred is to be injected into the marginal production


schemes? Is this supposed to take the place of the fertiliser subsidy, which is to be taken off during this year?

Mr. Williams: So far as I can remember the questions, I will answer them beginning with the last one first. The fertiliser schemes will now apply exclusively to grass and all seven-year-old grass land which is ploughed up as distinct from the present-day fertiliser scheme which covers arable land of all kinds. I replied to the question on marginal land in its widest sense in connection with an earlier question. The marginal land referred to in the Gracious Speech is something outside that referred to in this review, which is devoted more or less to marginal production as distinct from marginal land in its widest sense. The question of increased prices is a matter, of course, exclusively to be dealt with by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Food.

Mr. J. Langford-Holt: Can the Minister tell us whether in reaching this decision the proposed increased rail freights will or will not be implemented?

Mr. Williams: Yes and no.

Mr. Oliver Stanley: Can the right hon. Gentleman explain what he means by that not very lucid answer?

Mr. Williams: If it pleases the right hon. Gentleman, all these matters were taken into account at the February review.

Mr. Stanley: Then the answer was "yes."

Following are the further details:

LIVESTOCK AND LIVESTOCK PRODUCTS

Milk: The present average U.K. pool price will be increased by an average of seven-eighths pence per gallon. In addition the production bonus in England and Wales of 1½d. per gallon on the first 400 gallons per month in the winter will be increased by the equivalent of a further 1½d. a gallon in the winter months. Corresponding additions will be made in Scotland and Northern Ireland

Fat cattle, sheep and pigs: The following price increases are subject to grade and/or seasonal variation.

Fat cattle: There will be an overall average increase of 2s. per live cwt.

Fat sheep: There will be an average increase of ½d. per lb. of dressed carcase weight for fat sheep and lambs.

Fat pigs: There will be an average increase of 4s. per score lbs. deadweight.

Hen eggs: No change in the average annual price of 4s. 1d. per dozen paid by packing stations.

Duck eggs: There will be a reduction of 4d. per dozen in the average price.

The practicability of introducing in future years a system of payment for eggs according to weight grades will be examined during the next few months by representatives of the Agricultural Departments, the Ministry of Food and the Farmers' Unions.

CROPS

The following changes in crop prices operate with the 1951 harvest:

Potatoes: The acreage payment will be discontinued. Sound and marketable potatoes sold on or after 1st August, 1951, will receive an average price increase of 39s. 0d. per ton.

Sugar-beet: No change.

Wheat: The existing price will continue, but may, after consultation with the Farmers' Unions, operate as a guaranteed minimum price.

Barley: (i) There will be no maximum price for malting barley.

(ii) The current feeding barley fixed price of 21s. 6d. per cwt. will be a minimum price. The application of a seasonal range to this minimum is under consideration.

Oats: There will be no maximum price for milling oats.

Rye: The acreage payment will be discontinued and a partial compensatory adjustment in the price of rye offered for sale for human consumption will be discussed. The guaranteed minimum price for rye will be reduced to 21s. 6d. per cwt.

SCHEME FOR ENCOURAGING THE USE OF FERTILISERS FOR IMPROVING GRASSLAND AND MARGINAL LAND

This will be in two parts:

(a) There will be grants on the application to grass, including rough grazings and similar marginal land, of fertilisers


acquired after 1st July, 1950, i.e., the beginning of the first stage of the removal of the present Board of Trade subsidy. The grant will be one-third of the farmer's actual expenditure on the purchase of fertilisers up to a maximum of 25s. 0d. per acre, limited in any one year to one half of the total area of grass on each farm. The grant will not be approved by the county agricultural executive committee if the area under crops on the farm is considered insufficient. Either permanent or temporary grass will be eligible, excluding grass sown as one year ley which is now regarded as a tillage crop.

(b) Grants on the application of fertilisers after the ploughing up of grassland of at least seven years standing. The rate will be two-thirds of the actual expenditure up to a maximum of £3 per acre.

These details of the schemes apply only to England and Wales; some modifications will be needed for Scotland and Northern Ireland.

EXTENSION OF MARGINAL PRODUCTION SCHEMES

The marginal production schemes in the three countries will be extended to afford relief to farmers who are in a small or moderate way of business producing milk, pigs or eggs, where these commodities constitute the major part of their gross farm income, and whose farms are of such a nature by reason of position, size, soil or permanent equipment that they are heavily dependent on purchased feeding stuffs and have little opportunity by grassland improvement or otherwise to make their holdings reasonably self-sufficient.

County agricultural executive committees in England and Wales will be authorised to pay a proportion of the cost of farmers' purchases of feeding-stuffs. Administration in Scotland and Northern Ireland will take a somewhat different form.

The existing marginal production schemes in England and Wales and Scotland will also be extended in other directions. In England and Wales there will be a relaxation of the existing means test, and in both countries there will be additional provision for reclaiming semi-derelict land of the following chief descriptions: old ridge and furrow grassland which is difficult to cultivate

in its present condition; grassland covered by light scrub, anthills, rushes, etc.; and small areas of felled woodland if they are of high potential value for grass or tillage. Each application in England and Wales will be examined separately by the county agricultural executive committee, and a similar extension suitably modified will he operated in Scotland.

Skilled Workers

Mr. Baldwin: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he is aware that the present hostel system of casual labour is holding up agricultural production owing to the high rate of charges made by the county agricultural executive committees which are higher for unskilled workers than regular skilled workers; and what steps he proposes to take to make possible an increased supply of skilled workers

Mr. T. Williams: The answer to the first part of the Question is "No, Sir." As to the second, it is the policy of the Government to create conditions that will encourage recruitment to agriculture, and the figures show that this policy has met with marked success. As the hon. Member will appreciate, it is only on the farm that skilled workers are made.

Mr. Baldwin: Will the Minister consult with the Minister of Health, and make it known to him that we cannot get skilled agricultural workers until we have cottages to put them in?

Mr. Williams: If the hon. Member is not aware of it, perhaps I had better remind him once again that since 1945 the number of skilled workers has been increasing annually. It has gone up from 515,000, since we took office, to 580,000 today.

Poultry

Mr. G. Williams: asked the Minister of Agriculture when he expects to be able to lift the control on the minimum number of store poultry that can be sent to market

Mr. T. Williams: I regret that I cannot say when it will be possible to withdraw this regulation, but it now applies only in the areas around London and four other industrial centres in England and Wales.

Mr. G. Williams: Is the Minister aware that the number is 25, and that it is very difficult for small poultry keepers to muster 25 birds to send away to sell? As fowl pest is now receding, will he take off the restriction as soon as he can, to help the small poultry keepers?

Mr. T. Williams: I do not think we should be wise to withdraw any of these regulations until we feel sure that fowl pest is no longer with us.

Mr. Nugent: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he is aware that the small increase in rations announced for poultry is not sufficient to enable poultry keepers to play their full part in expanding production; and if he will give further consideration to the needs of the poultry industry, and particularly special producers, and say when he expects that increased allocations will be possible

Mr. T. Williams: The increases in rations announced a week ago are the most that supply considerations at present permit. I am well aware of the needs of poultry keepers, including the specialist producers, and their claims will be given sympathetic consideration when the possibility of a further improvement in ration scales is reviewed towards the end of the summer. I also recognise, as I believe do many producers, that additional supplies of feedingstuffs, by increasing the output of eggs, will enable unit costs of production to be reduced.

Brigadier Prior-Palmer: Is the Minister aware that the price of feedingstuffs for poultry has now fallen below the control point? Is that not an indication that these rations should be taken off?

Mr. Williams: No, Sir.

Beekeeping (Regulations)

Mr. J. Grimston: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will withdraw the regulation under which beekeepers may only put sections on hives which are collecting heather honey in order that clover section honey may once more be available

Mr. T. Williams: There is no regulation restricting beekeepers from putting sections on hives for the collection of clover honey. While raw materials for

making sections were short, supplies went mainly for the collection of heather honey, but the position is now rapidly improving.

Oral Answers to Questions — CRABS (MARKETING)

Brigadier Thorp: asked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he is taking to assist fishermen who have great difficulty at present in selling their catches of crabs

Mr. T. Williams: None, Sir. While the price of crabs generally have fallen, real difficulties in marketing have been confined to those areas where substantial quantities of small crabs of poor quality have been landed.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL FINANCE

Dog Licences

Captain Duncan: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many dog licences were issued in 1949

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Douglas Jay): In the financial year 1948–49, the latest period for which figures are readily available, the number was 3,050,062.

Wages (Policy)

Mr. Osborne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he has any statement to make respecting his recent negotiations with the Trades Union Council Special Economic Committee, with reference to the wage-freeze policy and the latest rise in the cost of living

The Minister of State for Economic Affairs (Mr. Gaitskell): No, Sir.

Mr. Osborne: Is the Minister satisfied, in view of the increased rise in the cost of living, that he can hold the wage-freeze policy?

Mr. Gaitskell: My right hon. and learned Friend is meeting the Special Economic Committee of the T.U.C. next week. I think it would be premature to make any further statement now.

Post-war Credits

Wing-Commander Bullus: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the outstanding amount of post-war credits owed to the people of Great Britain, and the present annual rate of repayment

Mr. Jay: The total amount of postwar credit outstanding is about £650 million. The present rate of repayment is about £17 million a year.

Wing-Commander Bullus: Would the hon. Gentleman consider making repayment in all cases of proved hardship?

Mr. Jay: I cannot anticipate the Budget in that matter.

Mr. Baldwin: Has the hon. Gentleman considered paying to the next-of-kin the interest on post-war credits which would have been paid to the holders if they had lived?

Oral Answers to Questions — GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS

Retiring Age

Mr. De la Bère: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will consider, in certain Government Departments, employing men over 65 years of age, subject to a strict medical examination, with special regard to the large number of first-class men who would rather work than draw a pension and continue to assist their country in any way

Mr. Jay: A considerable number of men and women over 65 are at present employed by Government Departments. I am not clear what further measures the hon. Member has in mind, but I would remind him that, in general, matters affecting the conditions of service of civil servants require discussion through Whitley Council channels.

Mr. De la Bère: Is it not a fact that these men are willing to work, and that it is the will of the Government that all should work? Where there is a will there is a way. Why not go further?

Mr. Jay: If the will were extended no doubt a way would be found.

Civil Servants (Political Rights)

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has come to a final decision as to whether or not to implement those recommendations of the Masterman Committee which would involve a restriction in the political rights of certain categories of civil servant

Mr. Jay: No, Sir. This matter is due to be considered towards the end of 1950.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Can the hon. Gentleman explain why, in view of the fact that the Committee reported in June last year, the Government have not yet been able to make up their minds?

Mr. Jay: The Government have already made up their minds, and put into operation those provisions of the Report which were in the direction of making conditions easier. On the other provisions, as has already been announced, we have decided to postpone a decision until later this year.

Public Relations and Press Officers

Mr. De la Bère: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will consider amalgamating the duties of public relations officers and Press officers in Government Departments in order to effect a saving in personnel

Mr. Douglas Jay: A separate Press Officer is employed only in a Department where the volume of work is so great that it could not be carried by the information officer himself.

Mr. De la Bère: Is it not a fact that there are an overwhelming number of public relations officers, and that many of these men are employed solely to boost the Ministers of their Departments? Let us have the truth for once.

Mr. Jay: No, Sir, Government Departments receive a great many inquiries from the Press, and it would be very inefficient if they were answered by a large number of different people.

Mr. Stanley: Can the hon. Gentleman say which are the Departments where this work is so heavy that they have to have two officers?

Mr. Jay: I can mention some of the Departments where that is not so. They include the Ministry of Pensions, Customs and Excise, Forestry Commission and one or two others.

Mr. Stanley: Am I to understand that these are the only ones who do not have two officers?

Mr. Jay: There are only one or two others; these are the majority.

Sir H. Williams: Is it not the constitutional practice that Ministers themselves are the only appropriate people to be public relations officers?

MEMBER FOR WEST BELFAST (ELIGIBILITY)

Sir Hugh O'Neil: (by Private Notice) asked the Leader of the House whether he is aware that the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Reverend J. G. MacManaway) has not yet taken his seat in this House owing to doubts having been expressed regarding his eligibility as a clergyman of the Church of Ireland to sit in Parliament, and can he indicate what steps he proposes to take to enable the House to determine the matter.

Mr. H. Morrison: Yes, Sir. I am aware that the hon. Member has not taken his seat because doubts have been raised regarding his eligibility. His Majesty's Government consider that this is a question which can best be handled by setting up a Select Committee of this House to report upon it, and a Motion will accordingly be put on the Order Paper.

Sir H. O'Neill: Is the right hon. Gentleman in a position to say what will be the terms of reference to the Committee?

Mr. Morrison: No, Sir.

Mr. Bing: Is my right hon. Friend aware that these objections have only been raised by one back bench Member of this House, and, in those circumstances, would it not be more profitable if the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Antrim, North (Sir H. O'Neill) were to communicate either to the Government or to the House the reasons why he thinks the hon. Gentleman may now be disqualified; whether he considers, for example, he is disqualified as a clergyman of the Church of Ireland, or, alternatively, as a clergyman of the Church of England through the operation of the Army Chaplain Act, 1868?

Sir H. O'Neill: Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that this is a matter which requires expedition, and will he set up the committee as soon as possible?

Mr. Morrison: If I may say so, the Government have been very forthcoming and reasonable about this matter. There is no obligation on the Government to do anything at all. I have given the right hon. Gentleman a favourable answer, and I really think that in the circumstances he ought to be happy for the week-end.

Mr. Churchill: When will the Lord President be able to place on the Order Paper the terms of the Motion appointing the Select Committee?

Mr. Morrison: I do not know, Sir, I will consider that. We have to consider the terms of the Motion.

Mr. Churchill: It was the terms of the Motion that I was asking about. Has the Lord President not been considering this in the number of days on which it has been discussed? Is he taken by surprise when, having been asked a Question and answered that he will set up a Select Committee, he is asked the terms of reference of the Select Committee? One would have thought that those two processes would have been gone through in his mind at the same time. [Laughter.] Do not be so insolent over there. You are only half the House remember.

Mr. Morrison: I am not surprised by the question the right hon. Member for Antrim, North asked. What I am surprised about is the mood and temper of the Leader of the Opposition. If I may say so, if the Conservative Central Office and the Conservative Party did its electoral business properly, it would not have left the hon. Member for Belfast, West in such miserable doubt as to what his legal status is.

Mr. Churchill: Is the Lord President not aware that the Conservative Party do not have the minute control over the selection of candidates which is practised on the benches opposite?

Professor Savory: Is the Lord President not aware that the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Reverend J. G. MacManaway) took the highest legal opinion before standing as a candidate?

Mr. Morrison: If the hon. Gentleman had the highest legal advice, why did he not take his seat instead of it being left to the right hon. Member for Antrim, North, to come to the House to ask for a Select Committee to be appointed so that the doubt could be resolved? I never saw such a muddle in all my life.

Mr. Churchill: Might it not be that the hon. Gentleman who is not with us, refrained from taking his seat out of deference to the laws and customs of the House of Commons?

Sir H. Williams: Is the Lord President not aware that, had this hon. Gentleman taken the Oath and his seat and not been qualified to do so it would have cost him £500 every time he appeared?

Mr. Morrison: No doubt that was a consideration taken into account by the high legal authority who gave him advice. Why there should be all this difficulty and unpleasantness when the Government have been so generous and forthcoming in the matter, I fail to see.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: We have had a number of questions on this. I think we might now pass to the next business.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Churchill: Might I ask the Lord President of the Council and the Leader of the House of Commons whether he has any statement to make on the subject of Business?

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): Yes, Sir. The Business for next week will be as follows:

MONDAY, 27TH MARCH—Supply (8th Allotted Day).

Report stage of the Navy, Army and Air Estimates, and of any Civil Supplementary Estimates announced for consideration today but not debated before 9.30 p.m.

At 9.30 p.m. the Question will be put from the Chair on the Vote under discussion and on all outstanding Estimates, Supplementary Estimates, and Excess Vote required before the end of the Financial year.

Consideration of Motions to approve the Import Duties (Consolidation) Order and the Import Duties (Exemptions) (Newsprint) Order.

TUESDAY, 28TH MARCH—Second Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill.

Debate on Foreign Affairs.

Consideration of Motions to approve the Purchase Tax Orders relating to road vehicles and calendars, greeting cards, etc.

WEDNESDAY, 29TH MARCH—Committee and remaining stages of the Consolidated Fund Bill, which it is proposed to take formally.

A Debate will take place on Fuel and Power on the Motion for the Adjournment of the House.

Second Reading of the Army and Air Force (Annual) Bill, which is usually a formal stage.

THURSDAY, 30TH MARCH—Consideration of the following Orders: Cinematograph Films (Quotas) Amendment Order till about 7 p.m.; and afterwards the Draft National Health Service (Superannuation) Regulations, and similar Regulations for Scotland.

FRIDAY, 31ST MARCH—Further progress will be made with the Diplomatic Privileges (Extension) Bill, and the Post Office and Telegraph (Money) Bill.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will open his Budget on Tuesday, 18th April.

It may also be convenient for me to state that it is proposed to adjourn for the Easter Recess on Thursday, 6th April, and to meet again on Tuesday, 18th April.

In regard to the business tomorrow, Friday, after the Summer Time Order we desire to complete the Second Reading of the Post Office and Telegraph (Money) Bill, and then to take the Committee stage of the Diplomatic Privileges (Extension) Bill.

Mr. Churchill: With regard to the Business on Tuesday, 28th March, I understand we are to have a Debate on Foreign Affairs on the Second Reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill. May we presume that this Debate will be opened by a statement by the Foreign Secretary?

Mr. Morrison: I am afraid that the answer is "No, Sir." The House will understand, of course, that it is sometimes right that my right hon. Friend should open, and sometimes he may have a discretion otherwise. This is analogous to a Supply Day on which the Opposition, within their right, have put down the question of Foreign Affairs, and my right hon. Friend feels that on this occasion it is reasonable that the Opposition should open and make their case, and that he should speak later in the Debate.

Mr. Churchill: But is this not a new Parliament? Have not, in any case, three and a half months passed since there was


a Debate on Foreign Affairs? Are we not entitled to have from the Foreign Secretary the information which this Parliament lacks entirely upon the whole field of Foreign Affairs before we are ready to make our own statements? Why should the House be denied what any other House of Commons would, I think, have received at its inauguration, or in its first month of life, namely a statement, in times of grave needs, from the Foreign Secretary?

Mr. Morrison: Of course, there could have been a Debate on this on the King's Speech, but the Opposition had their own means of handling the King's Speech. I personally did not agree with them, but it was their own business. This could have been raised on the King's Speech. I do not see that the fact of a new Parliament is decisive. My recollection is that in the last Parliament the right hon. Gentleman sometimes complained if my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary opened a Debate; and he also sometimes complained, I think, if my right hon. Friend left it to the Opposition to open. We are always anxious to do as best we can, but I think that sometimes the Foreign Secretary ought to have some reasonable choice of his own so that he can be left free to open or to speak later.

Mr. Churchill: Can the right hon. Gentleman give me some instance where we complained of the House having the advantage of listening to a statement on Foreign Affairs by the Minister who bears these grave responsibilities? I cannot recollect any myself. No doubt it fitted in very well with the right hon. Gentleman's answer to say that when he could think of nothing better, but I should like to know whether he has any evidence of it. In the second place, may I respectfully say that we have tried as much as possible to keep Foreign Affairs above the level of ordinary party disputes, and have given a great deal of support to the right hon. Gentleman. Surely half the House has a right to be considered by the Foreign Secretary when they ask that a statement should be made at the beginning.

Mr. Morrison: The recollection of the Prime Minister and myself is that it has worked both ways, sometimes the Opposition taking one view and sometimes another—I am not complaining

about that at all. But, it is really unreasonable to expect that the Foreign Secretary has always to make a comprehensive opening statement. This is, in essence, Supply Day time which the Opposition have claimed, within their rights, for a Debate on Foreign Affairs. Having claimed it, I do not think on this occasion it is unreasonable for the Foreign Secretary to take the view that the Opposition had better state their views and then he can come into the Debate later on. I assure the right hon. Gentleman that this half of the House does not wish to treat the other half with contempt. I must insist that the Government and the Foreign Secretary have a right to their opinions as well as the Opposition.

Mr. Churchill: Might I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that business is not likely to be advanced by the Government refusing to make a statement on foreign affairs? On the contrary, the resources of Parliamentary procedure enable us to raise the question, if necessary, on an Adjournment Motion. May I hope that the Prime Minister will say a word to the Foreign Secretary and inform him that it is the desire of this side of the House that he should open with a statement, otherwise there will be discursive interchanges between both sides of the House until he is pleased to get up? May I ask the Prime Minister whether he will make these representations to his colleague who is so closely associated with him in foreign affairs?

The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend will, no doubt, give full consideration to what the right hon. Gentleman has said, but foreign affairs range over a very wide area. If the Foreign Secretary is expected on every occasion to give a kind of tour d'horizon all round the world, it is very difficult when there may be questions and points which the Opposition really want to raise. It is reasonable that the Opposition should raise their points and set the line of the Debate they want, rather than that my right hon. Friend should make a discourse which might be off the points they want to raise.

Mr. Clement Davies: May I raise another matter on Business, and remind the Leader of the House that last week I asked whether time could be provided for


debating the Motion which stands in my name and the names of my hon. Friends?

[That this House views with deep uneasiness the treatment accorded to Seretse Khama; regrets that the Report of the Judicial Inquiry has not been published; and urges His Majesty's Government to reconsider both the publication of the Report and the decision to exclude Seretse Khania from his Chieftainship for a period of five years.]

The reply at that time was that that question should be postponed as a White Paper was being issued. As the White Paper was issued yesterday, will time now be provided for discussion of the Motion?

Mr. Morrison: I did not say that when the White Paper was issued time would be allocated. There was a suggestion that time should be allocated, and I said that the House would probably wish to look at the White Paper before making up its mind on the point. The White Paper has now been published, and although I cannot be dogmatic on what the House thinks, I think that the situation has improved somewhat after its publication. I am afraid my answer must be that I have no time available between now and the Easter Recess. I am very sorry, therefore, that I cannot oblige the right hon. and learned Gentleman in this respect.

Mr. Davies: Surely this matter raises vital and fundamental issues that not only relate to these people and their chief, but may have repercussions covering the whole of Africa and even a much wider area? May I ask the Leader of the House to consider that the country is now being administered, as far as one can judge, unconstitutionally against the will of the people? Is that not a matter calling for immediate Debate in the House which cannot be left standing until we come back after the Easter Recess? Is the right hon. Gentleman further aware that, as the matter stands after the publication of the White Paper, this Motion really amounts to a Vote of Censure?

Mr. Morrison: I do not want to be drawn into the constitutional issue of whether nine Members of the House have a right to compel a Debate on what they call a Vote of Censure Motion. I am prepared to Debate that at the right

time, and I do not think this is the time to raise that issue. The simple fact is that I have no time between now and Easter, and therefore I am afraid that I cannot give it. I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman has got the thing a little out of proportion. I really do not think it essential that the Debate takes place.

Mr. Davies: May I make a final application to the right hon. Gentleman? Could not this matter be raised on the Consolidated Fund Bill?

Mr. Morrison: My view, subject to correction, is that time on the Consolidated Fund Bill is in the nature of Supply, which is the prerogative of the official Opposition. I should be loth to interfere with the constitutional and traditional rights and the prerogative of the Opposition, because they are vital constitutional rights as a check on the actions of the Executive.

Mr. Churchill: Would it not be possible for the matter to be discussed on the Motion for the Easter Adjournment?

Mr. Morrison: That, of course, is a matter for Mr. Speaker in allocating the time for the different subjects on that day.

Mr. Davies: Surely this is a matter requiring a much longer Debate. May 1 appeal to both sides that this is a matter which raises such fundamental issues that it ought to be debated by the House before we adjourn?

Mr. Hopkin Morris: is not the position, according to the right hon. Gentleman, this—that nine Members of the House have no right to raise an issue which affects the good name of Britain and its Colonial Government, and that no satisfactory answer has been given to that problem by the White Paper?

Mr. Morrison: The hon. and learned Member is not being fair. I did not say that. The right hon. and learned Gentleman asked me whether I was not aware that the Liberal Motion was in the nature of a Vote of Censure. He was obviously raising the point that if it was, there was an obligation on the Government to find time for its discussion. I cannot concede that doctrine, even if the nine Members form a Parliamentary party.

Mr. Janner: Can we be given an indication of when legislation will be introduced on leasehold reform? My right hon. Friend will be aware that every day many people are being affected by the conditions as they stand at present. Will he press on the Commission to make their report and let us have legislation as speedily as possible?

Mr. Morrison: I have every sympathy with my hon. Friend and I know the importance of the matter. I believe that the Committee are reporting as soon as they can. Clearly we cannot act until that report is received.

Mr. Walter Fletcher: Will the right hon. Gentleman give Government time before the Recess for a Debate on Malaya, where the situation has deteriorated rapidly in the last few weeks, including the new feature of incidents on the island of Singapore itself? Does he not realise that when these matters are lumped into a general Debate on the Far East or on the Colonial Vote, the House has no time to concentrate on this serious problem? Does he not remember that two years ago when I and other Members asked for a Debate in the Government's time, he pushed it off and then the most serious incidents occurred. It is up to the Government to provide time for discussion of this serious business, which may become a major crisis throughout the Far East.

Mr. Morrison: My recollection is that on that occasion I suggested to the hon. Gentleman that he might persuade the right quarters to make it a subject for a Supply Day Debate, but as regards the period between now and Easter I have not got the time available

Brigadier Medlicott: Does the Leader of the House contemplate being able to find time for a discussion of the Motion on crimes of violence which stands on the Order Paper in the names of myself, my hon. Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Sir W. Wakefield) and my hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Renton)?

[That this House views with alarm the recent increase in crimes of violence, especially against women and children; that it rejects as misleading and inaccurate the contention that these crimes are the result of military service or training

and affirms that such a contention is an unworthy reflection upon British ex-Service men; and calls upon His Majesty's Government to set up an immediate inquiry with a view to bringing up to date the findings of the Cadogan Committee on Corporal Punishment.]

Mr. Morrison: I am afraid not.

Sir Richard Acland: Would my right hon. Friend sympathetically consider the possibility of extending Tuesday's Debate for an hour, because a good many Members may want to speak on that subject?

Mr. Morrison: I do not think that that is necessary.

AMENDMENTS TO BILLS (CIRCULATION)

Sir Herbert Williams: On a point of Order. In today's Order Paper, page 268, at the bottom appears these words:
For Amendments in Committee on Diplomatic Privileges (Extension) Bill, see pages one and two of Supplement to the Votes.
This morning I wanted to examine these Amendments for I knew some had been sent in, but I found that they were not enclosed with the document. It used to be the practice that notices of Amendments were circulated with the Order Paper, and I am rising to ask whether that practice cannot be resumed for the general convenience of hon. Members?

Mr. Speaker: Have the Amendments not been circulated?

Sir H. Williams: These Amendments are not now circulated, but are a special supplement. They have to be asked for at the Vote Office, otherwise one does not get them.

Mr. Speaker: I will look into that point.

NEW WRIT (ATTORNEY -GENERAL'S STATEMENT)

The Attorney-General (Sir Hartley Shawcross): With permission, I should like to make a statement with regard to what I hope the House will consider only an error of detail in the observations I made last Tuesday, when we had a discussion on the Motion to issue a writ for


the Neepsend Division of Sheffield. It is my duty and, of course, my desire to be scrupulously accurate in all the information which I give to the House whether it is a matter of detail or not.
The House may remember that I expressed the view that whilst the basic period of 21 days for the presentation of an election petition which might have the effect of awarding the seat to another candidate, should elapse before the House was moved to issue a writ for a new election, regard need not be paid, as had been suggested, to the longer period based on the date of the return of election expenses, and actually 49 days arising under Section 109 (3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1949, and still less to the unlimited period arising under Section 109 (2). In that connection I cited four precedents, of which one related to a writ issued in 1924. Whilst that case remains, for what it may be worth, a precedent for the general proposition which I made, I must tell the House, with regret, that owing to a typographical error for which, of course, I accept full responsibility, I said that the writ there was issued nine days after the return to a previous writ, whereas, in fact, the period was 39 days.
I hope the House will forgive me for this mistake, since the principle of my argument remains unaffected, and was indeed not that nine days or 11 days, as in the case of the 1922 precedent, was correct, but that the basic period of 21 days set out in Section 109 (1) of the 1949 Act ought to elapse, and that regard need not be paid to the 49 days under subsection (3), for which the 1924 case is still a precedent, although obviously not of such a striking nature.

Sir Herbert Williams: The Attorney-General's statement implied that the writ was issued in 1924 arising out of the death of a Member who was a member of the Conservative Government. Is it not a fact that the Member in question was Mr. E. D. Morel, who had been elected Socialist M.P. for Dundee on 29th October, 1924, and that Parliament did not meet for the first time until 2nd December. If my recollection is right, the

writ was moved on 8th December, at the instance of the whips of the Labour Party and not of the whips of the Conservative Party?

The Attorney-General: I suggested nothing to the contrary. What I said was there was a Conservative Government in office at that time.

Mr. Churchill: Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman satisfied in his own mind that this perfectly unintentional typographical error into which he fell did not exert an influence upon the decision which the House took on Tuesday last when it allowed the writ to pass?

The Attorney-General: I cannot say, of course, what may have influenced individual Members in the conclusion which they did take, but I feel sure that the right hon. Gentleman will agree that it could not have affected in any way the principle I am arguing, which was not that a writ could be issued in nine or 11 days, but that 21 days had to elapse. Once that 21 days had gone by, we need not wait, as was argued on the other side of the House, for the 49 days. Consequently, the case still remains on the precedent, although I agree it is not so striking a one as is needed for waiting the full legal period.

Mr. Churchill: May we assume that the learned Attorney-General will take special care to avoid repetition of errors so serious that they can confuse nine days with 49 days—[HON. MEMBERS: "Thirty-nine days."]—when majorities are so uncertain and when a balance on that sort of point might sometimes count?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Ordered:

"That this day Business other than the Business of Supply may be taken before Ten o'clock."—[The Prime Minister.]

Proceedings of the Committee of Ways and Means exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[The Prime Minister.]

Orders of the Day — SUPPLY

(7TH ALLOTTED DAY)

Considered in Committee.

[Major MILNER in the Chair]

Orders of the Day — CIVIL ESTIMATES AND ESTIMATES FOR REVENUE DEPARTMENTS, SUPPLE MENTARY ESTIMATE, 1949–50.

CLASS 11 VOTE 2. DIPLOMATIC AND CONSULAR ESTABLISHMENTS, &C.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £1,010,355, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the expenses in connection with His Majesty's Embassies, Missions and Consular Establishments abroad; certain special grants and payments, including grants in aid; and sundry other services.

BURMA (SHORT-TERM LOAN)

4.8 p.m.

Mr. Erroll: I beg to move that Item Sub-head DD (Short Term Aid to Burma (Loan)) be reduced by £100,
I should like to inform the House briefly that the Parliamentary Mission, of which I was a member and which visited Burma at the beginning of this year. was well received by the Speaker of the Burmese Parliament and that we were made very welcome guests of the Members of the Burmese House. We learned a great deal from our stay and were able to make acquaintance with a number of members of the Parliament of that country. This makes it more readily possible for us to speak frankly in a Debate on Burmese affairs than might otherwise be the case. I propose to speak frankly about this subject of a short-term loan.
The Burma Government have decided to make a permanent feature of their economy a State Agricultural Marketing Board, which possesses the monopoly of the exports of all rice which is grown in Burma. this State Agricultural Marketing Board, or S.A.M.B., is, in effect, a bulk-selling organisation and one of those

often given as an excuse by the British Government for having itself resorted to bulk purchase. We are in no doubt about the many disadvantages of Government-to-Government trade, but in this short-term arrangement we are finding yet another disadvantage in this form of trade. In this case we, as the would-be purchasers, are to finance the State Agricultural Marketing Board of Burma Not only are they having considerable administrative difficulties but they have run out of money and must needs apply to their intending purchasers for a short-term loan to see them through their difficulties
It is important that this Committee should realise that, had the export of rice been in the hands of the great City firms as it was before the war, this loan would be altogether unnecessary and we should be able to receive the rice which Britain and our Colonies require without any form of public loan, short-term or long-term.

Mr. Harold Davies: Do I understand the hon. Member to say that were the production of rice in Burma in the hands of private enterprise at this moment, there would be no need for Burma to apply for help to Britain?

Mr. Erroll: I am dealing not with production but with marketing, the financing of the purchase of rice from the peasantry in the paddy fields, its collection, its movement from the rice mills to the ports and other places of departure from the country. We are now being invited to make this short-term loan to the Burmese State marketing monopoly and we are entitled to know what terms and conditions are to apply to the purchases which the British Government may make.
Surely we are entitled to more favourable treatment than that which is set out in the circular letter issued at the beginning of the current year by the State Agricultural Marketing Board to all intending purchasers. Are we, for example, to get any reduction in the price? The S.A.M.B. announced a schedule of prices at the beginning of the current season prices which were higher than last year's, although there has been a fall in the prices of comparable food grains in all parts of the world

Mr. Harold Davies: It is the same price as in Siam.

Mr. Erroll: Are we to pay the price demanded initially by the Burmese Government, or are we to receive some concession in view of the loan which we are making? According to the circular, the buyer must accept any quality which the S.A.M.B. may choose to give him. A particularly obnoxious feature is that, in the event of any dispute, the rice, although it may be admitted not to be of the right quality, may not be rejected by the buyer. The buyer can submit the matter to arbitration, but not to the independent arbitration which was a feature of prewar rice dealings in Burma. It will be to arbitration by a surveyor appointed by the Union of Burma. We therefore have an unfortunate state of affairs in which the seller is in a position to control the independent arbitrator on questions of quality. I suggest to our Government that we might secure the benefits of independent arbitration in return for the proposed loan.
Since this Supplementary Estimate was introduced, there has been a reliable newspaper report of the Japanese intention of buying a large quantity of rice from Burma and possibly from Siam. The figure mentioned in Wednesday's "Times" is 500,000 tons. The total rice from Burma during the current season is not expected to exceed 700,000 tons. It would therefore look as though Japan may prove to be an important bidder and a big buyer of such exportable surplus of rice as is available. Can we be entirely sure in the circumstances that we shall get the rice for which this loan is intended?
I understand that the repayment, which is mentioned briefly in the details under the heading in the Supplementary Estimate, is to be by the export of the rice itself. There is a short risk period of three months between our handing over the money and the receipt of the rice in the bottoms of British ships. We are assuming that the rice will come forward. Certainly, it has been grown, but will it be put into British ships? Will there not be a danger of preferential treatment to Japan, now that she is coming into the market in such a big way, and with the attractions of other forms of trade which would perhaps suit the Burmese very well?
I want to ask how much we are expecting to get? Are we to confine our

purchases of rice to the amount which £500,000 represents? Or is that £500,000 to be regarded merely as necessary to prime the system of moving rice in the paddy fields to the ports? It would be of great help to the State Agricultural Marketing Board if they could know approximately how much we were intending to buy. If the British Government are accepting the beginning-of-season price, as I expect they will have done, there can be no real harm in saying how much will be bought at that price, but I would be the first to agree that we should not do so if we hope to secure an improvement on the present price.
It is also mentioned in the Supplementary Estimate that there is to be Commonwealth collaboration in this matter. I have since learned from the junior Minister, in answer to one of my Questions, that the proposed loan is not to be regarded as part of the Commonwealth loan which was discussed at Colombo, but is an entirely separate rice loan. In the circumstances, it would be of great value to this Committee to have some indication of the extent and the nature of the proposed Commonwealth collaboration.
I presume that our share of the loan will not be used in any way to finance purchases of rice by other countries, whether Commonwealth or foreign. We should have an assurance that this priming operation, as I regard the loan, is not to be a great help to the Japanese and that if they are to enter this field of rice purchasing, they must put down their own money. We must not, as so often happens nowadays, be handing out money so that others may get the benefit.
In return for the loan, I hope that the Burma Government will be pressed by our own Government to go back to private trading in rice, as it is far more efficient than any other method. However, knowing the predilection of the present Government for State trading, bulk-purchasing and bulk-selling, it is unlikely that they will impose any such condition. For that reason I move the reduction of this sum by £100.

4.20 p.m.

Mr. Wyatt: This seems to be a most extraordinary Amendment, because the actual sum of money involved in the Estimate has not yet been lent to the Government of Burma. For the hon. Member for Altrincham and


Sale (Mr. Erroll) to propose that we should impose upon the Burma Government a series of conditions which they must fulfil in return for money they have not yet received, seems a very strange departure in international relations. This money has been earmarked as our share of a Commonwealth rice loan should the negotiations for a Commonwealth rice loan as a whole become necessary and need implementation. None of this money has yet been received by the Government of Burma. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale seemed to suggest that in some mysterious way the fact that there was a State Marketing Board in Burma created a necessity for a loan of this kind which did not exist before.
In fact, it has been the practice for many years for the banks to advance money for the rice crop rather earlier than this in the year in order to enable the cultivators to get their money and so forth—a long process with which I will not weary the Committee. This has been done for many years, and no new departure is involved merely because the State Marketing Board is selling the rice in Rangoon to the buyers from overseas. Many banks in Rangoon—British banks primarily—used to finance the rice crop. They have not chosen to do so in recent years. Last year the Burma Government were unable to get a loan from the banks to finance the rice crop, and so they financed it themselves.

Mr. Walter Fletcher: Will the hon. Member say why they could not get it?

Mr. Wyatt: Naturally, because private enterprise has no patriotism. It is not in the least bit concerned about the welfare of the country or the welfare of Britain in South-East Asia. It merely said that this was not a good commercial risk and that it was not interested in lending the money. Consequently the banks would not lend the money and the Burma Government was obliged to raise it.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Wyatt: Three hon. Members are trying to interrupt me. I am not certain to whom I should give way so perhaps I will not give way to anyone.

Mr. Erroll: If it is not a good commercial risk—

Mr. Wyatt: Perhaps I may be allowed to develop the case a little before we have too many interruptions. I was saying that the banks would not advance this money because they did not think that it was a good commercial risk. The fact that it was extremely important for the future of democracy in South-East Asia that Burma should be able to get her rice crop out and sell it to India, Pakistan, Ceylon and other parts of South-East Asia was of no concern to the banks. I do not blame them for that; that is normal commercial practice.
As I have said, private enterprise has no patriotism and is not obliged to lend money in these circumstances. The Burma Government were forced to finance the crop by spaced sales of the rice in Rangoon to the Ministry of Food, which allowed them to finance it on an alternating basis. I presume that this year they have started a similar process, although it would be much more convenient for them to borrow the money from the banks as in the past and finance the crop directly themselves. So far, they have not been able to do that, and so far, they have not actually been lent this money, which is earmarked for that purpose if it becomes necessary.
In this House never for one moment have we allowed ourselves even to think that we would accept conditions from the United States of America when accepting Marshall Aid as to the manner in which we conduct our own economic affairs inside Britain. There seems to be no reason why the Burma Government should accept such conditions either. In fact, if the Opposition were really interested in promoting democracy in South-East Asia they would not even begin to make such a suggestion because, as they should know—certainly the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale should know, having now visited Burma—sensitivity in Burma about foreign interference is extremely high.
One of the great difficulties which the new Government have found is persuading the people of that country that it is not subservient to or dependent upon England and America but is a truly independent Government. Therefore, if we are to make suggestions here that no Government loan should be given to


Burma, unless the Burma Government are prepared to accept conditions for which they throw away any advance towards Socialism which they may have chosen for themselves, it is only—[Laughter.] Hon. Members opposite laugh. I know that they regard this matter as being extremely funny. It is of no concern to them whether we build up democracy in South-East Asia or not, or they would not talk as they do. They could not possibly talk as they do if it were of any concern to them. They think it extremely humorous.
This nation has been ruled by us for a long time and now it wants to run its own affairs in its own way. The view taken by the Opposition is not quite good enough for 1950 although it might have been good enough in 1900 or 1850. What we have to face in South-East Asia is a tremendous rise of nationalist feeling which in its advance with any form of democracy, is menaced by a counter upsurge of Communism, and if we try to impose conditions on a country like Burma which has newly found its independence, the Communist forces there will be given a tremendous fillip. They will be able to say that Burma is not yet independent but is still taking orders from England and America and that they will fight the semi-Quislings now in power so that they need not take orders from England and America. In such a matter as this we must use care and skill. If we are to impose conditions in advance on a loan not yet received, we shall certainly ruin the good relations which we are building up between Burma and ourselves.
There is another aspect of this matter. Hon. Members opposite talk frequently about the need for unity in the Commonwealth. Unfortunately in the past that has too often meant unity only of the white Dominions of the Commonwealth. As yet there are very few hon. Members opposite who sincerely think of India and Pakistan when they talk about unity between the Dominions in the Commonwealth. I hope there will be more as time goes by. India and Pakistan are perhaps almost the most important of the Dominions in the Commonwealth now. They may be the most important. With them and with Australia we are making an arrangement by which we treat Burma as a Commonwealth problem.
This sum of £500,000 is earmarked so that we can play our part in this joint Commonwealth arrangement should the need arise. If we are unilaterally to start imposing demands on Burma without consulting India, Pakistan and Australia, we shall hinder a wonderful step forward in Commonwealth consultation and joint working. Over the last year one of the most encouraging things in South-East Asia has been that the Commonwealth has been able to agree on a joint policy for a rice loan, the share which each country should put forward towards that loan and the policy which they propose to adopt in trade in order to stop the spread of Communism in South-East Asia and in Burma in particular.
If we in this House are to make all sorts of suggestions of conditions to be imposed on the Burma Government we shall very much upset our friends in India and Pakistan who are as much involved in this matter as we are. We do not rule the Commonwealth. We merely consult with the Commonwealth. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale should have been able to find that out while he was in Burma recently. He must realise that he is playing with dynamite when he produces this kind of Amendment in the House of Commons and seeks to impose all sorts of conditions on so tenuous a basis. I suggest that the Committee reject the Amendment quite emphatically and that we have it very clearly from all sides of the Committee that we do not propose to try to force upon Burma conditions which are unacceptable to her, and which are designed in the end to promote more and more Communism in that area.
We have to remember that if Burma goes Communist, she is next door to China and divisions have crossed over the Burmese-Chinese border in the past often enough. Also she is next door to Siam, which is next door to Malaya, and it is vital for us to do everything we can to assist the Burma Government. Even though hon. Members opposite may not agree with its politics, it is a democratic Government and the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale will agree that there has been no attempt by it to suppress newspapers or to limit Parliamentary discussion. It has had great difficulties in the past two years. In many ways Burma is still in an excitable state, but it has made much progress. There is much


more law and order there today than there was a year ago, and it is partly due to the wise policy which His Majesty's Government have followed. If we start to wreck that now, we shall hand Burma over to Communism and all the things which hon. Members opposite profess to dislike.

4.31 p.m.

Mr. Gammans: I must try to bring the hon. Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) off the sizzle, back to the point we are supposed to be discussing, this rice loan to Burma. The hon. Member said that it was an extraordinary Amendment which my hon. Friend has moved. Well, it is an extraordinary transaction that we are being asked to pass today. We have heard a lot about bulk-buying being financed by the taxpayers of this country, with results not altogether in their favour; what we are being asked to finance here is somebody else's bulk-selling as well.
Let us understand what has happened with regard to the rice in Burma. It is the story of a tragic fiasco. Before the war Burma exported between 3 million and 4 million tons of rice; now she is exporting only something of the order of three-quarters of a million tons. When the hon. Member for Aston tries to find reasons for supporting the present form of Burma Government, he might consider whether those figures justify all the eulogies that he has paid.

Mr. Wyatt: Does the hon. Gentleman really think that more rice would be produced if we withheld this loan?

Mr. Gammans: I want to find that out. That is one of the things we ought to discover from the Government before we pass this money. After all, it is the money of the British taxpayer with which we are dealing. Listening to the hon. Gentleman one would think that this country had money to splurge all over the world.
It may be that this loan is justified, but we want much more information than we have had today. Is it not the fact that the peasants in Burma are not at the present time prepared to produce rice for the Government buying depots without cash and, as the Burma Government have not any cash which the Burmese peasants are prepared to take,

the British taxpayer is being asked to put it up? Is not that a paraphrase of the situation? It may be justified that we should do it. It may be necessary that we should do it, but let us know what we are doing and what guarantees we have that this money will not go down the drain like so much of the other money which the taxpayer of this country has poured into Burma in the last two years.
I want to ask the following questions. Having put up this money, what are our guarantees that the rice will be forthcoming, especially since it appears that since the Supplementary Estimate came before the House, the Japanese have entered the market? How do we know that the Japanese, backed with American dollars, will not come along and get the rice when we have put up this money? This House ought to know, and the hon. Member for Aston ought to know before making the kind of speech he made just now.
My other question is this: Are we and the Commonwealth the only people who are putting up loans to Burma? I have seen a report by Reuter from Washington dated 6th March as follows:
Burma has asked for economic and military aid from the United States, Reuter learns authoritatively today. Burmese embassy officials told Reuter their Government had informed the State Department of the kind of assistance they would like to receive from the United States.
We, of course, have no reason to query Burma making application to the United States, but we are entitled to know before passing this loan whether we are likely to get the rice, who else is in the market for it, and to what extent the Burmese are not only asking for financial help from us but from America as well. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will give the Committee this information because we are entitled to have it before we pass this Estimate.

4.35 p.m.

Mr. Diamond: I am happy to be able to agree with the first sentence of the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Errol). The deputation of which I had the good fortune to be a member was received with the greatest possible courtesy, good will and friendliness by the people, the Speaker and the Members of the Parliament of Burma. So far as I am concerned, it was an expression of friendship that I shall never forget.
I am extremely sorry that the hon. Member has such a short memory that he has forgotten everything he saw and heard with his own eyes and his own ears in Burma in my company. I am sorry that he should have forgotten the tremendous admiration which all of us felt for the organisation of the State Agricultural Marketing Board—the very organisation, the very tool which the Burma Government are using for the appropriate purpose of disposing of the rice crop. At all events, it permits me to say that I was most impressed with that organisation, and anyone who has considered the figures of rice exports for 1949 must share with me my admiration that the S.A.M.B. were able, in spite of the insurrection and the enormous difficulties in that country, to come within an ace of their programme of 1¼ million tons.
The hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) referred to certain figures, carefully leaving out the relevant ones. He referred to the pre-war exports; he referred to the possible exports, of which nobody has any detailed figures as yet because they are a matter for the future; he has not told us of the immediate postwar exports; he has not told us of the enormous increase in exports since the Burma Government achieved independence that has taken place through the medium of the State Agricultural Marketing Board. With his great knowledge of that country I should have thought that the hon. Member would have appreciated that, inasmuch as no country has been bombarded and blitzed as much as Burma, for it to get back even to an export of 1¼ million tons compared with its pre-war export is a great achievement.
I am delighted that the Government are proposing to make this loan in order to relieve the Burmese peasant of the burden of money lending to which he has been subjected hitherto. Everybody who knows what happens in Burma realises that it was part of the normal machinery of marketing the crop that moneylenders should lend money to peasants and to farmers at exorbitant rates of interest to enable them to go through the season until the next crop matured. And everybody realises that, the Burma Government have done a most creditable job in extinguishing completely that form of financing.
I am sorry indeed that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale should have forgotten that point, and should not have stressed to the House our condemnation of money-lending. If I am mistaking him, if he is not with me in condemning money-lending, I will willingly give way and allow him to say that he is in support of it. I should have thought however that he was, with me, condemning it and, therefore, supporting the Government in replacing on commercial terms and at commercial rates of interest, money which was previously loaned at moneylenders' terms and rates of interest.
For those reasons, I hope that the Committee will throw out the Amendment without any hesitation whatever. I would go further and say it is a great mistake, if I may say so in a non-party spirit, because on a matter like Burma, as with the Commonwealth, which is associated with us in this loan, we try as far as possible to be non-partisan.

Lord John Hope: What about the opening of the hon. Member's speech?

Mr. Diamond: I am only too glad to answer any question which is put to me. The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale knows full well that if there was one thing which concerned the Burmese more than any other, it was the fear of the change in attitude which might follow as between this country and Burma from a change in Government here. I did my best to reassure the Burmese that there was no likelihood of that, and I am glad to be able to say, with my enormous majority of 42, that I have been able to carry out my promise.
The hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, however, made the most memorable statement in Burma when he said that he would be only too glad to make a gramophone record, so that the Burmese could play it and refresh themselves with the memory of his melodious voice, repeating as often as might be necessary that if a Conservative Government were to be returned, it would make no difference whatever in the attitude which this country had towards Burma.
I ask the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale to read through his speech, to remember the Amendment which has been put down and to realise that it is put down, not only under his important


name, but under a no less important name than that of the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler), and to see whether that bears out the view which we are anxious, I am sure, on both sides of the House to show, that, irrespective of which Government is in power in this country, our attitude to Burma will be one of sympathy and good will.
It is in terms of that sympathy and good will that I support the loan entirely. It is good sense, it is good finance. It is a most commendable example of Commonwealth co-operation, which everyone of us would wish to support. It is complementing State trading where it has done a good job. There is no question of financing, as the hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) suggested, State trading in the interest of replacing losses. This is merely a temporary loan which is to be returned. I should like to know what trading organisation in this country would accept a loan from its bank at normal bank interest if the bank said, "Yes, we are prepared to lend you the money provided you completely alter your political views," which is what the hon. Member for Hornsey suggested.

Mr. W. Fletcher: Will the hon. Member for Blackley (Mr. Diamond) be a little fair to my hon. Friend? No single statement from this side regarding the alteration of political views has been made. I hope to have the opportunity later of refuting what the hon. Member has said; he himself should refute it here and now.

Mr. Diamond: I will withdraw immediately if I have done any injustice to any hon. Member who has spoken or if I have made the slightest inaccurate reference to what has been said. I listened very carefully to the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale and I thought he was basing the first part of his objection to the loan on the fact that it was helping State trading, to which, he said, he strongly objected. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] Apparently, that is within the recollection of everybody present.

Mr. Erroll: I was quite clear in what I was saying, which was simply that I objected to a loan for a State selling organisation because that is yet another reason against such forms of trading; that one has to subsidise the other side

and that it might not always be possible for us to come forward with loans; and therefore, obviously, a return to private trading would undoubtedly be better. That is not politics—it is common sense.

Mr. Diamond: I am quite sure that the hon. Member for Bury and Radcliffe (Mr. W. Fletcher) will not now ask me to withdraw what I have said.
I am sorry that the Amendment should have been put down, and I ask the Committee wholeheartedly to support the loan, not only for the reasons I have given, but for the supremely important reason that it is a token—a very small one admittedly, but nevertheless a token—of our desire to help Burma. We all know that Burma is today in the front line of anti-Communism. We all know that food is the first weapon in anti-Communism, and that in giving this loan we are helping Burma and are helping the production of food, and that we are working with the Commonwealth in this action. For those reasons I hope that the Committee will wholeheartedly reject the Amendment.

4.46 p.m.

Mr. Walter Fletcher: I am delighted to have the opportunity of following the hon. Member for Blackley (Mr. Diamond). I am certain that his recent visit to Burma has been of great value, as were those of other members of the Mission, but I must point out that my connection with that country and with these matters goes back, possibly, a little further. Putting aside the political aspect as far as possible, I should like to get back to what the Amendment is really about: whether this is the best means of procuring, in an orderly way, at a reasonable world price, and with the correct quality, the maximum amount of rice, which is not solely a matter of helping the producer and, thereby, helping Burma, but of helping Malaya or any other country which, if rice goes short, will be open to Communistic influence more than ever.
I would refresh the hon. Gentleman's memory; he, after all, twitted my hon. Friend about shortness of memory. Does the memory of the hon. Member for Blackley go back to the occasions in the last four or five years in the House of Commons when we discussed the procurement of rice in Siam, when a contract


for 1,250,000 tons was gaily signed by Lord Killearn in 1946, when the delivery of that rice was 700,000 tons short in the first year and took about three years to be delivered? Does he not think that that is a justification for a certain sensitivity, to use the phrase of the hon. Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt), on our part to see that the rice is delivered?
Does he realise that it is ordinary business prudence and caution, whether the buying is done by the Government in bulk or by an individual firm, that before the contract is signed it is natural to settle the terms of that contract and to see that they are fair and equitable terms? Does he realise that the quality of everything being shipped from both India and Pakistan in the way of commodities in the last two years has gone down to such an extent—both with jute and hides and wool and deliveries of every sort—as to raise a great deal of perturbation? Let the hon. Member for Blackley ask the Bank of England about the claims that exist that have not been settled.
Is it not perfectly correct, in protecting the interests of the taxpayer in this counry, that we should look at this factually, as the hon. Member in his business capacity would do, and ask these very pertinent questions: Are we going to get delivery of the rice in view of what happened in Siam, and what was the reason why it was not delivered in the case of Siam? Let us analyse that. The first reason was that the producer and the holder of that rice did not receive any share of the foreign currency that was paid for it; it remained in the hands of the Government. I saw many senior Members of His Majesty's Government about this personally, because, in spite of what the hon. Member for Blackley says, we on this side are very often not only extremely keen that things should go well there, but very keen to make a contribution.
I should like to remind the hon. Member that the barrier in obtaining the rice, which remained there for three years, was the action of the local Government in not giving inducement in the form either of foreign currency or in goods which were wanted, against the rice to the producer. It is, therefore, perfectly right and natural to ask in the case of Burma, with no sense of hostility at all, with the idea of establishing a medium which would

help the Government, the producer, and the consumer in the rest of the world, that we should ask a pertinent, normal commercial question: is it really certain that, under the terms of this contract as it is drawn, we shall get delivery of the rice because the producer will get a proper deal from his Government?
That is not interference, it is a normal thing to ask. The method of arbitration is, I think, very open to question. In the old days when there were established in this country many commodity exchanges the fairness of arbitration here meant that if a buyer in Brazil and a seller in Australia, had a dispute, they brought it for arbitration and settlement here because there were undoubtedly, fair, uninterested third parties who could deal with the matter. But that does not obtain in this case as the arbitrator is one of the interested parties.
It is an ordinary business precaution to try to avoid having another Supplementary Estimate on this matter next year and that makes us ask the question as to the effect on the Burma Government. There are many of us here who have made certain sacrifices and are keen on Burma for every sort of reason. If any Burma Government, of any sort, is to have a future and establish itself on sure foundations, it must be inevitably on the basis that they are not wrongly protected from the cold winds of reality and the outside world. If we make an arrangement by financing them in a way that will not stand secure and is not a reasonable business proposition—I am not talking about usury and do not propose to listen to any ridiculous accusations of that sort about the banks there—

Mr. Diamond: rose—

Mr. Fletcher: Allow me to finish the sentence. Unless it is shown that this method of finance, from the time the loan is made to the Burmese Government and buying commissioners are set up, to the time when it is given to the producer, or the man who holds it, or collects it, is a sound method, we are doing no service at all to the Government. This must not be on a basis of goodwill and trying to support a Government of which we might approve, or on a charitable basis. That would be doing no service at all. It must be on a basis which will stand up to the ordinary laws of economics.

Mr. Diamond: I am grateful to the hon. Member for having given way and for having shown that it is possible to misunderstand my remarks by assuming that my reference to moneylenders was a reference to banks. If the hon. Member misunderstood that, it is possible that others may also misunderstand and I am grateful for the opportunity of pointing out that I did not use the word "usury" in relation to banks and I had no intention of referring to banks. My information was that it was private money lending entirely divorced from the banks.

Mr. Fletcher: I am grateful to the hon. Member for having made that point and I hope that his hon. Friend the Member for Aston has listened to it carefully because it would take a great deal of the sting out of his remarks. To accuse us of doing something wrong in raising this point, when the sole object is to see that the contract is carried out really well and when in recent years there was an incident in Siam—a neighbouring country—of disastrous failure because the contract had been wrongly drawn, wrongly worked out and carried out—

Mr. Wyatt: rose—

Mr. Fletcher: I have not the slightest intention of giving way to the hon. Member; he is not worth it. I believe that it would for that reason be wise of the Government not to treat this as a hostile act on our part. We are seeking to examine the facts of the case and to see that this contract is carried out well from beginning to end. There must be some question of security for this loan, from its inception until it is repaid. Countries which have to come forward and confess that through no fault of theirs their financial situation is such that they have to borrow in this way have very often to be assisted with advice and help on the question of repayment. There must be give and take on both sides and if, for some reason, an extension may he needed, that must be examined. This is not a hostile act, but an effort to help, by people who have a real knowledge of Burma and other Eastern countries. We have put down the Amendment to elicit from the Government whether they have really thought of this question in these terms, or have not.

4.55 p.m.

Mr. Harold Davies: The hon. Member for Bury and Radcliffe (Mr. W. Fletcher) wants to introduce some reality into the Debate. On other occasions he does so, but today I think he has been very unreal. There is nothing wrong in the Opposition wanting to know the facts about conditions in Burma and the conditions under which this loan is to be made, but I am certain that my hon. Friend the Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) was right when he said that the way in which the Amendment will be interpreted in parts of South-East Asia will be to make them think that the Opposition are more or less playing party politics—[HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—merely playing party politics. It was rather unfortunate that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) illustrated his speech by specifically mentioning the issue of bulk-buying.
During the General Election, the right hon. Member for Woodford (Mr. Churchill) received letters from the West Indies—I hope the Opposition will correct me if I am wrong; I had better say I believe he received them—

Mr. Oliver Stanley: I have not any idea.

Mr. Davies: —and that they were concerned with whether or not the Conservative Party regarded bulk-buying as part of their Colonial policy for the maintenance of trade and industry in the Colonies. In the "Malay States Times" there was an article on this subject only a few weeks ago. The party opposite say they want to kill Communism, yet they talk of this loan as wasting the taxpayers' money. If we lose a little money in the fight against Communism, I would prefer that to losing the blood of Britishers. I look on this loan as a type of British Marshall Aid to a country in Asia which is trying to develop a democratic way of life. In this country we protest about interference by outside bodies and when we make this loan we are quite justified in expecting the State Agricultural Marketing Board to work it in a manner fitting to the country itself.
One would think that the economic deterioration in Burma had only been caused in the past few years. The truth is that of all countries in the Far East, Burma suffered more than any other in the war.
We know, for instance, that next year the estimate is that the shipment of rice will be 60,000 tons short. If this Amendment in any way restricts the production of rice and makes the target even less than that, how far do the Opposition think they will be helping in the fight against the spread of Communism in South-East Asia, of which they are so afraid?
I understand that the acreage of rice sown this year is 7,666,300 acres, whereas last year it was 8,763,800 acres. This is due to the civil war and to problems that Burma has faced in working out a democratic way of life. Thus, already only 68 per cent. of Burmese rice will be available for her commitments this year. It is not only rice that is suffering like this. Hon. Gentlemen opposite know full well that timber is at a standstill and cotton and the production of peanuts and even oil, about which I see they have another Amendment on the Order Paper.
The hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) spoke of trade with Japan but this type of Amendment would drive trade to Japan.—[Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but only the other day U Thet Su, Chairman of the State Agricultural Marketing Board, was trying to organise an agreement by which 100,000 tons of rice was to be supplied to Japan. Time and again I have heard the hon. Member for Bury and Radcliffe say that we wanted rice and food to solve the Malay problem. How far can we expect this Amendment to help in solving that particular problem? Surely it is encouraging the attitude that not much would come from Britain if the Conservatives were in power, that they would investigate every one of these loans on the basis of the old-fashioned business methods that created such chaos in this country in the past 30 years. The present situation in Britain is due entirely to the old-fashioned method associated with a struggle for markets, areas of investment and routes for those markets. Members opposite are still preaching today the kind of philosophy that they preached in the 1850's.

Mr. W. Fletcher: rose—

Mr. Davies: The hon. Member is not worth giving way for. One cannot treat him seriously. I am delighted that the Government have in their wisdom decided to encourage any honest effort within Burma to establish a democratic way of

life, I can think of no better way than producing rice. If we desire to defeat Communism in Asia, we shall do so on the rice fields rather than on the battlefields. I sincerely hope that this House will reject the Amendment.

5.2 p.m.

Lord John Hope: I had not intended to intervene in this Debate until I heard the speeches that have been made from the benches opposite. Even now I intend to make not so much a speech as a very short and, I hope, reasonable interruption. Early in his speech, the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) said something by way of warning in connection with the possible interpretations which might be put abroad upon speeches made on this side in this Debate. I ask him to reflect how much he and his hon. Friends the Members for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) and Blackley (Mr. Diamond) have contributed towards a proper interpretation of the views of those of us on this side by the way they have interpreted our motives in their speeches this afternoon. Their speeches have been unfortunate, to say the least.
The Prime Minister of Burma said, when Burmese independence became a fact:
What both sides have sought and I believe have achieved is nothing less than arrangements which will form a firm and solid basis for Anglo-Burmese friendship.
I would make the suggestion to hon. Gentleman opposite that critical advice has never been inconsistent with true friendship. What is inconsistent is an unwillingness to tell the truth to your friends, an unwillingness which, in the case of Burma, I believe one or two hon. Members opposite share. The hon. Member for Aston warned us about the sensitiveness of the Burmese towards the acceptance of critical advice given by Englishmen, on the grounds that it might well be interpreted by other Burmese as weakness. Although I know that that attitude has been held and is almost bound to be held by certain people at a critical stage in a country's transition from dependence to independence, nevertheless there comes a time when the truth and the telling of it can only help everyone. I suggest to the hon. Member for Aston that that time has now come.
suggest to those in Burma who may feel sensitive about critical advice that the time has come for them to realise that a change of mind might now be interpreted, not as a sign of weakness but as a sign of their new-found strength. They will find that the advice which we on this side will give them, which will be selfless and objective, will be given not only for the benefit of our own people in this country, but also very much for the benefit of Burma.

5.6 p.m.

Mr. R. A. Butler: Before the Minister replies, I should like to add a few words to those which have been said on this side of the Committee. So far as I can see, this Debate will have served sonic useful purpose if it can educate certain hon. Members opposite in the ordinary practices of the House of Commons, especially in Committee. If we can achieve that, we shall have achieved something. Further, I trust that this Debate may he of some purpose in indicating to the people and to the Government of Burma the full facts about the Conservative attitude towards that country and its Government. I will spend a little time on those two aspects before I address myself to the attractive subject of rice.
It is not for me to give a lecture on liamentary procedure, and if I did, you, Sir Charles, would perhaps rule me out of order. It is in order for me to say, however, that this Amendment for a reduction in the Vote has been moved for the specific purpose of attracting attention to a particular Item on the Diplomatic and Consular Vote on which we desire to obtain further information, and subject to the reply which will shortly be given by the Under-Secretary, I see no reason why my hon. Friends should press this matter. In fact, we have no desire to do so.
I must remind hon. Members opposite that had we not adopted this procedure, we could not have centralised the discussion on this particular aspect of the Diplomatic and Consular Vote. If they propose to continue with these very intransigent and most unreasonable speeches we have heard, we shall be perfectly ready to range over the whole of the Diplomatic and Consular Vote and keep thoroughly busy for the rest of the

afternoon the two new Ministers who have just taken up their duities in the Foreign Office. Those two Ministers have taken up the responsible position which I used to occupy alone in the days when we had no Minister of State, and when the Under-Secretary was expected to do two men's work. They might just as well be given a little practice. It has always been my view that the representatives of the Foreign Office do not appear often enough on the Floor of the House, and this might be an occasion for helping to remedy that state of affairs. We shall certainly not be satisfied by a speech from the Under-Secretary alone. I feel certain that the Minister of State will desire to intervene on this occasion and give us the benefit of his wide experience of Burma.
I must address myself to the speeches which have been made by the hon. Members for Aston (Mr. Wyatt), Blackley(Mr. Diamond) and Leek (Mr. Harold Davies). Those three hon. Members seem to me to have fallen into the error, prevalent in the last Parliament, and which we then attempted to kill—and which I hope we can kill forever in this Parliament—that they have a monopoly of friendship for the peoples of the East. That is totally and absolutely untrue. The hon. Member for Aston made some extremely exaggerated remarks about the attitude of the Conservative Party. The hon. Member for Blackley, with a little less than the usual brilliance which we associate with his name, said that because my name was attached to this Amendment, there was something sinister in it as indicating the unfriendliness of the Conservatives to Burma. The hon. Member for Leek launched into a most inaccurate account of the magnificent contribution which private enterprise made to the past prosperity of Burma. It remains to be seen whether Burma can achieve such prosperity in the future.

Mr. Wyatt: We should like to be fair to hon. Members opposite, but is the right hon. Gentleman now saying, in effect, on behalf of the Conservative Party, that they are sorry they voted against the Burma Independence Act when it came before this House?

Mr. Butler: I was addressing myself to the subject on the Order Paper, and subject to your Ruling, Sir Charles, it


is not in order to range over the whole subject of an Act of Parliament which is not before us this afternoon. I was addressing myself to the quite intemperate and unreasonable remarks of the hon. Member for Aston. I should like to say to him and to hon. Members opposite that there are several people on this side of the Committee, myself included, who began to work for the independence notably of India, Pakistan and Burma long before they ever thought of it, and we shall continue working for the good of those countries long after he has finished doing so. Perhaps it would be just as well if that sort of message went across to the headlines of the Burmese newspapers at the same time as the intemperate and inaccurate remarks which the hon. Gentleman himself made.
Now let us address ourselves to this complex question of rice. We noticed when examining the Supplementary Estimates, which it is our constitutional right and duty to do, that there were these two interesting items on Burma. We are taking the first one now; and some rather wider considerations will have to be raised on the second one. But upon this, the first thing we want to know is whether in fact this is a settlement of what may be described as Commonwealth aid to Burma which we understand amounts to some £7½ million, of which the British Government are going to shoulder half. That will be £3¾ million and if that part, that proportion, is laid down in this Supplementary Estimate, it gives us an opportunity to consider this matter in Parliament, as indeed it should be considered.
I say quite frankly to hon. Members opposite that if we are to be deterred by unreasonable speeches which traduce our motives in raising matters on which we require information, I think the whole objective of the procedure of Parliament will have been thwarted. We have not been informed of this loan before. We have received no account of what happened at Colombo. The Foreign Secretary even refuses to open a Foreign Affairs Debate to tell us something about these things. We have obtained the minimum of information from the Foreign Office, and had we not taken the opportunity of raising this matter here, on the Supple-

mentary Estimate, we should have learned or heard nothing about this Commonwealth loan which emanated from the Colombo Conference. I trust, therefore, that the Under-Secretary will enlighten us a little bit on the point of the extent of the money to which the British taxpayer would be committed by a loan of this sort.
I further want to know the nature of the loan; what is the nature of the security and what is the nature of the repayment of the loan? I should like also to know the nature of the transactions whereby we or the other countries concerned, notably India, Pakistan and Ceylon, obtain rice under the arrangements made? When we examine the world situation with regard to rice, we find that in the days before the war in the South-East Asia area rice provided some 61 million tons for export. In 1949 it had dropped to 2,600,000 tons; and we believe that for 1950 not more than 2,200,000 tons will be available. Rice is the very basis, not only of the fight against Communism, to which hon. Members opposite have referred, but is the staple diet of that part of the world. Proper transactions in relation to the rice crop and the sufficient growing of rice are the very basis of the solution of the problems of the South-East Asia area.
As regards the details, I am informed that the exportable surplus in 1949–50 is probably in the nature of 800,000 tons. According to my information, which I should like either to be confirmed or refuted by the Under-Secretary, some 600,000 tons of that amount have already been sold. If that is the case, what is the position of the United Kingdom in relation to rice exports which it may desire, and what is the position in the transaction of the State Marketing Board to which reference was made by the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll)? While I am mentioning this question of State trading. I think I should say that hon. Members opposite are extremely touchy if they consider that they are to be allowed to give full vent to their belief in State trading, and that we are not to be allowed to make any reference to our own views without being told that we are insulting a foreign Government.
I think it quite essential in this Parliament that we should all be absolutely


frank in our intimate beliefs. The fact is that we do not like State trading, and I do not mind who knows it, either in this country or overseas. From my knowledge of the people of that country, with which my family have been most intimately, and I believe honourably, associated, they are the most cheerful and friendly people; and they would be extremely surprised to hear, at any rate from my lips, sentiments which they knew were insincere, and which did not represent my Parliamentary beliefs. From some knowledge of other peoples and Governments in that part of the world, I am quite convinced that they are just as ready to face the truth from people who say what they believe, as they are to take untruths when they know they are uttered in an insincere way.

Mr. Harold Davies: I would not like it to be put on record that we thought hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite were insulting Burma. So far as I can remember now, I am certain that those words were not used by myself; neither were they used by my hon. and right hon. Friends on this side of the Committee. I would say, secondly, that I am quite certain that hon. Members on both sides of the Committee are concerned with the production of rice in Asia and it would be unfair of any of us on this side of the Committee to say that hon. Gentlemen opposite were not concerned at that. Lastly, we differ only on the approach, and the party political line, we really believe, was introduced by the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale asking that some control over the methods of marketing in Burma should be introduced. That is why the Debate took the line which it did take.

Mr. Butler: The hon. Member has been fortunate in being able to make an extra speech which in any case is quite in Order, but, inserted in my speech, it becomes an absolute jewel; because attention will be rivetted on my remarks, and the hon. Member may feel satisfied that these remarks of his at least will be read.

Mr. Davies: Cheap!

Mr. Butler: I should like also to thank the hon. Member for his very greatly

improved tone. I can see that already we have had a moral victory in this Debate, because the argument on that side of the Committee started in an extremely acid, acrid and bitter manner and it has been converted, by reason of the arguments from this side, into a most sweet and reasonable response. Therefore, we have already gained our main objective, except for the information we hope that we shall have from the Under-Secretary.
I was saying that the Burmese would be the first people to understand when we state our beliefs, and I have no need at the present time to go further into that matter. I simply wish to ask what is the position of the Board? Was the Board indebted to the rice millers for rice of the previous season and is that why it cannot operate without further funds? If that be the reason, it will be an interesting fact to elucidate from the Under-Secretary as the reason why the loan is necessary. Then, is each of the Commonwealth countries helping with this loan to receive an allocation of rice, or is the rice to be handed over for disposal to a committee of the lending countries for distribution as it thinks fit? Perhaps the Under-Secretary can answer that point. Further, what, as I asked earlier, is the security for a loan of this character, and what is the nature of the terms for the repayment?
I put that last question because, while it would be out of order to go into it in any detail, it is well known that there are some £30 million of loans outstanding which at some date are expected to be repaid to this country. In view of the very straitened and difficult circumstances under which the Burma Government are at present operating, it would be interesting to know what are the possibilities and likelihood of the repayment of this loan.
Before I sit down, I wish to raise this question of the trade between Japan and Burma. We saw in "The Times" newspaper of yesterday a telegram from Tokyo dated 21st March that a trade agreement has been ratified between Japan and Burma providing for an exchange of Roods amounting to £17½ million during 1950. Reference to the many items in the trade agreement would be out of Order, but one of the items is rice; and we should value the opinion of the


Foreign Office as to the terms of this treaty; what it means; what it is likely to do to the very straitened supplies of rice available for the Eastern peoples themselves; and what is the importance to their future of that trade agreement? So far, no opinion has been given to the Committee or to the House on this matter, and it would be very valuable, not only for the Lancashire Members, but also for those interested in rice, to have some further opinion given on this occasion.
Those are all the matters on which I think I can usefully comment on this subhead, while reserving the right to raise the broader issues on the next one. I would make an appeal to the Under-Secretary. I trust that he will not follow the tone of the speakers who have preceded him on his side of the Committee. I believe he occupies an extremely responsible post in the Government. We have no desire to import into the realm of foreign affairs any particular controversy unless that is necessitated by the failure of Government policy in any respect. As this is a Debate upon the Diplomatic and Consular Vote, I hope that he will confine his remarks to the facts of the case and not import into the situation any unnecessary rancour.

5.20 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Ernest Davies): I appreciate the remarks which have been made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler). I do so because in the first speeches made here this afternoon there was considerable misunderstanding as to the purpose of this Vote. The reason why there was a little acrimony on both sides of the Committee was due entirely to that misunderstanding. It was perhaps unfortunate, because of this, that this Amendment was put down and—

Mr. Stanley: What does the hon. Gentleman mean.

Mr. Davies: I think it was unfortunate that this Amendment was put down because it has resulted o in some remarks being made during the Debate which do not, I think, help us in the pursuit of our policy in South-East Asia.

Mr. Stanley: The hon. Member surely understands, and if not we must make it

plain, that the only way on Supplementary Estimates in which we can concentrate the discussion of the Committee on a particular item in the Vote of a Department is by putting down a reduction. That was the sole reason why an Amendment was put down in this case. We cannot help it if hon. Members opposite do not understand the rules of the House.

Mr. Davies: With all due respect, I should have thought that. when Supplementary Estimates are presented, it would not always be necessary to put down an Amendment in order that the Supplementary Estimates could be discussed.

Mr. A. Edward Davies: On a point of order. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Stanley) has raised a most interesting point. He says that this subject could not have been discussed—that we could not have given it the same attention—if there had not been an Amendment. I was under the impression that when a substantial sum of money appears for the first time on a Supplementary Estimate and when it is not a fraction of a main Estimate which has previously appeared, it can be discussed.

The Chairman (Major Milner): Certainly it can be discussed.

Mr. Stanley: Is it not the position that on a Supplementary Estimate, the Opposition, by tradition of the House, can choose which Votes are put down, but they have to be put down in a block. We can put, as we have done, first the Consular and Diplomatic Vote. That means that the whole of that Vote is open to discussion at the same time, and the only way in which the Committee can be restricted to considering only one item at a time in that Vote is by moving a reduction to the particular item in the main block.

The Chairman: Yes, I think that is correct.

Mr. Diamond: Is it not open for the Opposition, when putting down an Amendment of this kind, to act in one of two ways—either to ask for information and then withdraw the Amendment or, alternatively, to speak critically and to pursue the Amendment? Therefore, should not the first person who speaks for


the Opposition on such an Amendment make clear what the object of the Opposition is?

The Chairman: I do not think that I should be drawn into expressing an opinion in any way on that subject. These matters may be discussed in half a dozen different ways.

Mr. Ernest Davies: I return to the question of the loan. Perhaps the way in which the sub-head is written into the Supplementary Estimate has caused some misunderstanding as to its actual nature. It is stated to be a short-term loan to Burma. Possibly, a more accurate description would be a "rice loan" because, in reply to the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden, I can say that this is not part of the larger loan. This is an entirely separate loan which is limited to £500,000. It may not be called upon, and none of this loan has as yet been provided to Burma. In the event, it may not be provided, but it was put down in the Estimates because it seemed likely that the offer would be made to the Burmese and that their reply would be received by the time the Estimate came up for consideration. It will be possible to discuss the far larger loan to which reference was made when the Estimates of the Foreign Office are under discussion. That amount appears in the Estimates which have now been printed, and there will be ample opportunity to discuss the whole policy when the Estimates are debated.
This loan arose from discussions with the Commonwealth countries for the purpose of assisting Burma in financing the provision of rice to Commonwealth countries. The object was to facilitate the purchase of rice by India, Pakistan, Ceylon and, of course, this country. It was agreed in principle at the Colombo Conference last January that it should be a joint Commonwealth loan. Our share is only £500,000. It is limited to that. It should be borne in mind that that does not cover a very large amount of rice. The total amount of money involved in the financing of the rice crop of Burma would be something like £30 million, and the £500,000 advanced by this country is a very small proportion. It is necessary to keep our sense of proportion when we discuss the amount involved.
Several questions have been asked about the terms of the loan and the nature of repayment. I have been asked whether any conditions are being imposed upon the Burmese. This is a straight-forward normal commercial loan, and it can be regarded as a revolving credit. No money will be provided until the rice is provided, and then it will be liquidated and the money will be available for the financing of the further purchase of rice if that is desired.

Mr. W. Fletcher: Will the hon. Gentleman clear up two points. He said that no money will be paid until the rice is ready. Is this rice lying at the port in the bottom of the ships, is it in the canals, or where is it? That is an important point. I have one other question. Why does the hon. Gentleman always speak of "conditions to be imposed." Conditions can be negotiated by two friendly parties without any question of their being imposed.

Mr. Davies: The situation of the rice is a matter for negotiation. It depends upon the time when the loan is finally agreed. On the second point, the reason why it was suggested that there was an imposition of conditions was because certain hon. Members made the implication. The position is that at this stage we cannot say what the terms will be, because they are subject to negotiation. When the negotiations take place, the terms will be decided upon. They will be on a normal commercial basis, a low rate of interest being charged in accordance with the guarantee that will be given.
The present position about the purchase of this rice is that the United Kingdom will be buying for itself and its Colonial Territories including, of course, Malaya which, as was pointed out by the hon. Member for Bury and Radcliffe (Mr. W. Fletcher), is very important in that part of South-East Asia, and Ceylon which is in considerable need. As these agreements have not yet been negotiated, it is not possible to reveal at this stage the figures of the probable amount to be taken by us and by the various Commonwealth countries. We do not consider that it would be wise at this stage even to indicate how much these Commonwealth countries are negotiating for, as it might prejudice the negotiations and make it more difficult for them to reach a successful conclusion.
It is true that Japan is in the market and negotiating for a certain proportion of the rice, but we do not consider that that fact should in any way make it more difficult for us to obtain our requirements. I say that in spite of the references which have been made to bulk purchase this afternoon. We consider that working closely in consultation with the Commonwealth countries, and also working through the Marketing Board in Burma, we should be able to negotiate reasonable terms for this purchase, and we are not concerned about Japanese competition in that field. Nor have we any information that 600,000 tons have already been sold, as was suggested by one hon. Member. Certainly, there will be no political considerations to be attached to the loan; we can state that categorically, but we do not yet know whether the loan will finally go through.

Mr. Gammans: Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, would he make clear exactly what he meant? Do we understand that no money will, in fact, be advanced by this country unless the rice is actually in our hands in one form or another? Is that what the hon. Gentleman meant? If that is what he meant, why should he say that it is an advance of funds to Burma for the financing of rice purchases, which suggests that money is going to the Government of Burma to enable them to buy the rice? Would he give an explanation?

Mr. Davies: It is put in that form in order to cover all contingencies, but the present intention is that this is a short-term loan and that it is to be repaid in cash within a few months. I think that is the answer to the hon. Gentleman's question. As soon as the rice starts flowing and is available, obviously, the loan will be covered many times over by the rice which is available, but this is a revolving credit which will, so to speak, lubricate the flow of rice, and there is no reason for us to question the honour of the Burmese in honouring the terms which will be negotiated with them. So far, the Burmese have already honoured, as we expected of them, all the agreements which we have entered into with them, whether they concerned rice or not. On that score, I do not think hon. Members need question the attitude of the Burmese in this matter. Hon.
Members have no reason to fear that the Burmese will fall down on it, inasmuch as they did not fall down last year.
Reference was also made to the participation, or at least the interest, of the United States in Burma. Here again, we have no information, but, of course, if the United States is interested in coming to the assistance of Burma, then we would certainly welcome it, but we do not see any reason why we should be concerned about it.
This is part of our larger policy in giving assistance to Burma at the present time. As other hon. Members have suggested, Burma is a food-producing country supplying South-East Asia, and it is of vital importance to a very large section of the community in that part of the world. We therefore feel that, if we can in any way assist them by way of financing the crop, not only are we contributing towards the production of foodstuffs in Burma and South-East Asia, but we are also facilitating the flow of that crop into the countries which most need it, and, in particular, Commonwealth countries.

Mr. Erroll: As the purpose of our Amendment was only to focus the discussion on this particular sub-head, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

BURMAH OIL CO. (GUARANTEE)

5.40 p.m.

Mr. Erroll: I beg to move that Item Sub-head EE (Compensation Payment to the Burmah Oil Company Limited), be reduced by £5.
I hasten to reassure hon. Members that the purpose of this Amendment is to focus attention on the second of the two subheads, which relates to Burma and concerns a guarantee which, we now learn, the British Government gave to the Burmah Oil Company early last year in respect of its rehabilitation operations in that country. I think it will be necessary for me to outline very briefly the background to this guarantee and state the reasons that led up to it.
After the war, the Burmah Oil Company was engaged in a big programme of rehabilitation of its oilfields, pipelines and refineries, which had been damaged


during the war and also partially destroyed in order to prevent their use by the Japanese invader. That programme of rehabilitation was making good progress while the British were still in the country after the war, but, when independence came to Burma, law and order disappeared and it became impossible for the Burmah Oil Company to continue with its rehabilitation work. The company has spent up to about £10 million of its own money on this rehabilitation work, and, towards the end of 1948, it became clear to the company that, owing to the continued disturbed state of the country, it was useless to proceed with further rehabilitation.
The new Burma Government then made an approach to the Burmah Oil Company and suggested that the Burma Government should partly finance further rehabilitation work, in return for a share in the Burmah Oil Company itself. Negotiations then took place between the Burma Government and the British Government for the necessary money to enable the Burma Government to do this. Thus the British Government was being asked to pay the Burma Government the money necessary for the Burma Government to acquire a share in the Burmah Oil Company. The negotiations took some considerable time and the Burmah Oil Company were quite unable to continue further rehabilitation work. The British Government in an earnest desire to do all they could to help the new Government of Burma, thereupon guaranteed to the Burmah Oil Company a full return of all the moneys expended in rehabilitation work if carried on after an agreed date.
Obviously, the British Government and the Burmah Oil Company hoped that such a guarantee would never, in fact, be called upon. However, after some further months of protracted negotiations, the British Government finally decided in January of this year that the state of the country was such that it could not give a guarantee of the further cost of rehabilitation by the Burmah Oil Company. The announcement that a guarantee had been given nine months previously was made at the same time as the Burmah Oil Company had to announce that large-scale dismissals would take place as a result of the withdrawal of that guarantee. Since then, dismissals have taken place,

but a number of the staff are still employed at the refinery or, rather, are still on the pay-roll at the refinery.
We require, and I hope we shall receive from the Government today, a full statement on why the guarantee was not made known at the time when it was first given. I think it is quite intolerable that Parliament should only be told months afterwards that a highly expensive guarantee had been negotiated with the Burmah Oil Company. It is obvious, of course, that the Government hoped that the guarantee would never have to be implemented. But, in fact, it is having to be implemented, and this Supplementary Vote is a token amount with which to start the implementation of the guarantee.
Why were we not told about this at the time? Why, too, was it not made public, so that the people of Burma could know what practical assistance the British Government were giving to its people? The net result of this secrecy has been that the full odium for the dismissals has fallen upon the Burmah Oil Company, who are being blamed for what are described as "ruthless sackings," when, in fact, they are merely carrying out the instructions of the British Government. The secrecy in regard to the guarantee has undoubtedly harmed the company's position in Burma, and has resulted in the British taxpayer—who is, after all, going to foot the bill—receiving no credit from the people of Burma for his great generosity.
It is stated that the sum is not expected to exceed £1 million. Nearly all of that sum has been spent on wages, and I understand that very little will go on materials. Therefore this £1 million represents, not a gift to the Burmah Oil Company, but a large measure of unemployment relief to Burmese oil workers. That may or may not have been a good thing to do, but we must be quite clear that this is not any measure of assistance to the Burmah Oil Company as such. It is certainly not helping them to pay their dividends, and I hope that no hon. Member opposite will start any innuendoes of that sort. This money is simply unemployment relief to Burmese oil workers, and it has had no effect at all, since they had to be dismissed in any case.
I do not think that the British Government really care very much about the fate


of this company in Burma, or whether their action has helped or harmed the company. We in the last Parliament saw just what the Labour Party thought about many British industries. In fact, the more successful a British company in this country, the more clearly was it to be marked down for nationalisation or expropriation. I hope that we shall not hear from the Minister that this guarantee was in any way designed to help the company. There was no such motive in the Government's mind.
The figure of £1 million, as I have said, is largely made up of wages for the workers in the oilfields and at the refineries. I cannot agree, however, that the figure will not exceed £1 million. I think it is much more likely to be about £2 million when the final bill is rendered by the company. The fact is that, although the company were given instructions to carry out the dismissals when the British Government withdrew the guarantee, very few of the refinery workers could be dismissed because of the rather complicated procedure of the new industrial court in Burma. There is a rule in the industrial court procedure that when a reference has been made to that court, no employees may be dismissed, and therefore some 3,500 refinery workers have remained on the books of the company and continue to receive their weekly wages for doing no work whatsoever. That is a cost, of course, which will have to be met by the British taxpayer. It represents what I would call a terminal payment which may be of a very high order indeed, and may well amount to something like £500,000 before the industrial court reports on its findings and the company is then free to dismiss its redundant staff.
If the Burma Government and the people of Burma had known about this guarantee, we might surely have been entitled to expect that they would have hastened the procedure of the industrial court so as to avoid the British taxpayer being put to unnecessary expense. Hon. Members opposite may say that I am once again trying to impose conditions on an independent country; but I think that where the British taxpayers' money is concerned, we are entitled to get something in return for it, and we cannot idly stand by and see more and more of the money of the British taxpayer being poured out on vague unemployment relief

in Burma without some attempt being made on the part of the Burma Government either to reduce the unnecessary idleness which is taking place or to find alternative employment for these men.
Of course, as things stand at present, it is in everyone's interest in Burma, except that of the Burmah Oil Company, to prolong and delay the proceedings in the industrial court, because the longer the proceedings take, the more money must be paid out in wages to employees who are not at work. That money, I submit, will have to be found out of this Vote. I know that the Minister, in reply to a Question of mine earlier this week, indicated that the guarantee would refer only to money expended during the period of the guarantee; but the Minister cannot possibly escape the terminal obligations, the consequences of withdrawing the guarantee, because those consequences are very much more severe now in 1950 than they would have been had the Burmah Oil Company been free to dismiss its staff early in 1949.
The fact is that the people of Burma have become much more conscious in the last few months of industrial court procedure, and have learned what a valuable weapon it is to them for extracting more money from foreign-owned companies, and, in this case, for extracting more money from the British Government. Had the Burmah Oil Company been able to dismiss its staff early in 1949, they would have been dismissed without the industrial court procedure being invoked, with all the expenses involved. This is proved because the company was, in fact, able to dismiss some 2,500 in August without such procedure being invoked when the modified joint venture scheme did not go through.
It is claimed, therefore, that the present cost of continuing to employ these people, or, rather, I should say, to pay them, must be a cost which in equity should be borne under the terms of this guarantee. When the Minister comes to reply, I should like him to state whether he has made any suggestion to the Burma Government that events might be hurried up in Burma so as to reduce the extent of these terminal payments; or would that he regarded by hon. Members opposite as an unwarrantable measure of interference in the internal affairs of an independent country, and are we just to


witness the pouring out of money, month after month, while these proceedings in the industrial court go on wearily and unendingly?
I should like to ask the Minister what representations he has made to the Burma Government about the protection of the property of the Burmah Oil Company during the period of this guarantee. We have the situation in which the British taxpayer has had over £1 million of his money spent in paying the wages bill of the employees of this company and, at the same time as this was going on, of seeing the property and the assets of the company being steadily looted and plundered. It is said that the Burma Government have done their best. I wonder whether they have? It is significant that they have made practically no use of the British Military Mission. That is another expensive piece of aid we have given Burma in order that her troops might be more effectively trained and able to keep organised banditry in check.
The truth of the matter is that the British Labour Government do not really care very much about the Burmah Oil Company, or what happens to it. That is the only conclusion to which I can come, because the situation has been allowed to go from bad to worse. However, the money has been spent and the guarantee has been given—unfortunately without Parliament's knowledge. Nevertheless it is plain that Parliament will have to honour this guarantee.
Is there anything we can learn from this fiasco? Is there any way in which we can get something now out of the money which has been spent? Can any good come from this costly and wasteful expenditure? Possibly it can. I believe we can show we have learned a lesson. We can show that we have learned the conditions which must govern any future aid. I know that hon. Members opposite are touchy if any reference is made to conditions being attached to a loan. But why should there not be conditions? After all, the people of Burma are perfectly free to reject a loan if they do not like its conditions. There can be no question of imposing conditions. The other party has a perfectly free right to reject a loan, or to reject it if it dislikes the conditions.

Mr. Diamond: Is the hon. Gentleman referring to financial conditions exclusively, or possibly political conditions also?

Mr. Erroll: I am coming to the conditions I would suggest. What we have learned from the operation of this particular guarantee is that money spent in Burma is wasted until law and order are restored. It ought to be one of the conditions of any aid we may give that really energetic steps will be taken to secure the return of law and order throughout the country. I think it is agreed by most people that we can have a restoration of law and order only when there has been a full and satisfactory settlement of the Karen dispute.

Mr. Wyatt: On a point of Order. Are we not now discussing a specific loan to the Burmah Oil Company? Would it not be out of order to discuss a settlement between the Karens and the Burmese?

The Chairman: I think it would be out of order. As I understand it, we are discussing compensation payments.

Mr. Erroll: With respect, Major Milner, I agree that we are discussing this payment, but it is specifically stated that this compensation payment was to give the Government an opportunity of restoring law and order. That is stated on page 14 of the Supplementary Estimate in line 3 of the small type. I therefore think that I am in order to refer to the maintenance of law and order.

The Chairman: The money has been given. I do not think that is any justification for talking about the details of the present position.

Mr. Erroll: I understand fully the ruling you have given. I would have expected, however, that the hon. Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt), who ranged very widely on a much narrower vote, might have accorded me the courtesy of allowing me to finish—

The Chairman: The hon. Member for Aston was perfectly entitled to draw the attention of the Chair to the hon. Gentleman's infraction of the rule, and I am obliged to him for doing so. The hon. Gentleman would also appear to be reflecting on the Chair.

Mr. R. A. Butler: With respect, Major Milner, law and order are specifically


referred to as the reason for granting this money, and I suppose we can refer to the need for the restoration of law and order for the purpose of making that money a stable proposition.

The Chairman: In reply to the right hon. Gentleman I would point out that the question of Jaw and order is one of the past, and has been dealt with. I think, therefore, that it should not be a matter of present discussion.

Mr. Butler: My information goes to show that this grant is not necessarily limited to the sum included in the Supplementary Estimate, and in discussing that Estimate, are we not entitled to ask whether this is the last instalment to be paid to the Burmah Oil Company?

Mr. Ernest Davies: Notice of termination has been given of this guarantee, so no further liability can be incurred other than is provided for by the token payment.

Mr. Erroll: I had in no way intended to make any reflection on the Chair, Major Milner, when I addressed my remarks to the hon. Member for Aston and that hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well what I had in mind.
I regard it as regrettable that during the period of this guarantee, when it was operating, such ineffective steps were taken by the British Government to assist the Burmese Government in the restoration of law and order. The effect has been negligible. The expenditure of this money might have resulted in a great improvement in the internal situation of Burma had we only been willing to realise that, by giving this money as unemployment relief, we were surely entitled to say something about what should be done with it. We were surely entitled to insist to the full on the protection of British assets in that country and to insist upon proper protection from looting. We might well have said that we disapproved of the discriminatory treatment to which other companies were subjected. Had the guarantee been generally known to the people of Burma and of this country, it would have been easier to say these things, and we might have been able to carry a considerable measure of Burmese political opinion with us in this matter. Now an extremely difficult terminal position has resulted.
The guarantee may have terminated, but the payment has not, and His Majesty's Government cannot possibly escape from liability for this terminal payment. During the period of guarantee the British Government, had they had a mind to do so, could have enlisted more successfully the co-operation of the Burma Government in speeding up industrial disputes through the industrial court. As it is, this is going to be very costly to the British Government. They might also have taken the opportunity of offering a financial adviser to the Burma Government without any strings. That adviser would have been able to help in the proper application of any further aid which may be given to Burma in the future.
We all recognise, on both sides of the Committee, that Burma is in grave danger from within and without. We appreciate fully how easily Burma could become a centre of Communist infection in South-East Asia. We should help the Burmese Government to improve their position, to restore law and order and to settle the Karen dispute as soon as they can. I believe the lesson our Government have learned from the expenditure of this £1 million is that in future we must be quite firm in our lending policy and not be afraid to give advice and to make conditions at the same time.

6.0 p.m.

Mr. Diamond: I should like to congratulate the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) for two reasons. First of all, he was good enough to make clear at the start of his speech that this Amendment had not been put down, as we in our ignorance might have assumed, to give the Opposition an opportunity to criticise either this Government or the administration of the Department, but that it was merely for the purpose of seeking further information. In that I join with the hon. Member. I am sure we are all glad to have information on a rather complex matter of this sort.

Mr. Erroll: It surprises me to learn that the hon. Member for Blackley (Mr. Diamond) should have forgotten the excellent lecture which he gave on Parliamentary procedure in Rangoon, in which he dealt, among other things, with the niceties of our Parliamentary procedure.

Mr. Diamond: It is obvious that anybody who would listen to me talking


about Parliamentary procedure must be very ill-informed on that subject. I was therefore very glad indeed that the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler) took the opportunity in our last discussion of making it absolutely clear that in all quarters of the House we are united in our desire to give help and support and to act sympathetically towards Burma. I am glad there is no misunderstanding whatsoever that the Amendment was not put down to criticise the Government or the action of the Government of Burma.
My second reason for congratulating the hon. Member is because of the excellent speech he made on behalf of the Burmah Oil Company. As an accountant, I offer him my professional congratulations. No one could have done it better. He got all the terms right, including "terminal payments." No doubt, the Burmah Oil Company are very grateful to him for having put forward their case in such an excellent manner. He certainly carried out his duty with extreme care, treading delicately midway between the path of suggesting that we should not be careless with taxpayers' money and at the same time making it quite clear to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs that the Burmah Oil Company were not only going to ask for expenditure incurred under the guarantee but that they were also going to ask for payments which, he alleged, they had incurred after the guarantee period. I am sure he trod that path with great delicacy, considering his very substantial proportions.
I too should like information on this question of the guarantee, because I find it very difficult to form any clear idea of how this guarantee will be interpreted, having regard to the answer which my hon. Friend gave the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale two days ago. He said:
… His Majesty's Government invited the Burmah Oil Company and Associated Corn-panics to continue the work of rehabilitation for a period after 7th March. They agreed to guarantee the Company against any losses incurred during this period which were attributable to their response to His Majesty's Government's request."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st March, 1950; Vol. 472, c. 110.]
We have to consider losses incurred during a period when rehabilitation was

continued. Rehabilitation was continued during the whole of this period of the guarantee. My information from responsible officers of the Burmah Oil Company at the Burma oil fields was that not a single man had been idle. At least, I hope they were responsible officers; I do not wish to tie the Burmah Oil Company in any way. The answer given by the cost accountant of that company to me as an accountant was clear and precise—not one penny had been charged to idle time. That means that everybody had been fruitfully occupied either in building up assets or in earning income.
This is a matter which gives one considerable doubt as to what the word "losses" means in relation to this rehabilitation. If the Burmah Oil Company at a future date re-establishes its business, as we all hope it will, and is able to supply oil, all the rehabilitation work which has been carried out during this period and which accounts for a large part, if not all, of this £1 million will be money well spent as far as the Burmah Oil Company is concerned. In that case the hon. Member will be quite wrong in his statement that under no circumstances should we misunderstand the position as being one in which the Burmah Oil Company has had any benefit at all from this transaction.
If that position does materialise, the Burmah Oil Company will have spent £1 million, taking this figure as the correct figure for the moment, on improving its assets. It will, therefore, have £1 million worth of improved assets and will have been refunded the whole cost by His Majesty's Government, and at no cost to itself. It will have bad £1 million worth of improved assets, in taxpayers' money with which the hon. Gentleman is so concerned. Therefore, my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will help us all if he can give us any indication as to how this guarantee is to be interpreted.
I nevertheless feel that in terms of other than pure business terms this was a wise transaction, because it helped tremendously in keeping down industrial unrest, in helping to establish law and order, in giving the Government—a new and young Government which was struggling manfully with great difficulties—an opportunity of having some of those difficulties removed for the time being. Everyone


was hopeful for the best of reasons that this liability, if it did mature, would not prove too great, and at all events the benefit from keeping down industrial unrest would be of service on all sides. For that reason I am glad that this guarantee was entered into, but I hope, with the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, that the taxpayers' point of view will be carefully considered in interpreting the terms and fixing the amount of the guarantee.

6.8 p.m.

Sir Harold Roper: I am exceedingly fortunate, in addressing the Committee for the first time, to find myself speaking on a subject which is very near to my heart. I have lived many years in Burma, and I have long experience in the Burmah Oil Company.
The hon. Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) said there was a lack of interest taken by private enterprise in the welfare of Burma. I do not know whether he has been in the oilfields; if he had been in the oilfields before their demolition, I feel sure that he would not have said on the Floor of this Committee that private enterprise took no interest in the people of Burma. One great pride I have is that I had the privilege of leading a company in the East which has paid so much attention to the welfare of its workers in the last 20 years. I have also had experience in the Legislature of Burma and, as a former Member of the House of Representatives and of the Senate, I am particularly interested in this matter of procedure to which reference has been made. I am also interested to know that the hon. Member for Blackley (Mr. Diamond) has lectured in Burma on legislative procedure.
I have learned from past experience of procedure, not in this legislature but in the Burma legislature, that an Amendment proposing a cut in Supply is put down in order to raise a subject for discussion and not necessarily to oppose it. It would not he appropriate for me, in making my maiden speech, to dwell on the events which led up to the situation in which Burma finds herself today and in which the Burma Government are themselves unable to finance the loan to the Burmah Oil Company. The first approach made was between the Burma Government and the Burmah Oil Company. The Burma Government made the

first suggestion of a joint arrangement and terms were agreed. The Burma Government were unable to find the finance, however. It was not until that point that His Majesty's Government intervened.
I will not go into the course of events which led up to the situation in which the Burma Government were unable to find their own finance. To do so would be to enter into the realms of controversy, which would be inappropriate in a maiden speech. My concern is for the future of Burma and the future of its people. I am still interested in their future and I am interested in stopping the spread of Communism into that part of the world. We have, therefore, to examine this item in the Supplementary Estimates both from the point of view of financial soundness and from the point of view of its value as an insurance in preventing the spread of Communism.
This Debate was preceded by a Debate on the rice position and it has been made clear in this Committee today that the rice industry is extremely important to the economy of Burma. If rice is the most important, then the oil industry certainly comes second. If help is to be given to Burma there is no better way of giving it than, first, by ensuring the success of the export trade of the rice industry and secondly the survival of the oil industry. The Burmah Oil Company was a good employer and there was none better in Burma. The oil industry of Burma is an immense asset to the country. May I make it clear that I am not in the Burmah Oil Company and I am not speaking for them; in stressing its importance, I am trying to bring before this Committee a point which it is essential that the Committee should understand in considering this matter of the guarantee.
The hon. Member for Aston dealt in some detail with the course of events leading up to this loan. It is important, in considering the Government's action in giving this guarantee, that we should realise that the oilfields in Burma are some 300 miles up-country. It is an industrial area and a semi-arid area where there is no alternative employment of any importance. It is a country which would be quite unable to sustain the addition of the large numbers of unemployed which would be thrust upon it if the Burmah Oil Company closed down.
The hon. Member for Blackley raised an important point about what would constitute the losses to the Burmah Oil Company in this rehabilitation. I trust that in his reply the Under-Secretary of State will make quite clear what is the Government's interpretation of this guarantee which they have given to the oil company—whether that guarantee is to be held for payment at some indefinite date when it may be possible to determine whether loss has actually been incurred. How long do the Government propose to wait before they decide this question, which is obviously fundamental to the giving of this guarantee? I trust that in his reply the Under-Secretary will make this clear.
The Estimate refers to the guarantee as being made pending other measures of financial assistance to the Government of Burma and I hope I may be allowed to say a few general words on the giving of such guarantees and loans to Burma. There is no doubt that unless someone helps Burma, the country will fall into complete anarchy. It may be asked, "Are we not throwing good money after bad?" When the Burmah Oil Company undertook this vast scheme of rehabilitation, they did so as an act of faith. There was no certainty that Burma would ever resume its normal condition. I do not accept a suggestion that we are throwing good money after bad. I maintain that we must not abandon hope. We cannot tell what will arise in Burma and what the position may be in the Far East.
As I see it, the tragedy of Burma is that, in gaining that last 5 per cent. of political freedom, she has lost other freedoms—freedom from violence, freedom from fear and, as the circumstances of this guarantee made clear, freedom from unemployment. In Burma it is the political aspect which draws public attention and which is apt to disguise the real wants of the people of the country which are to be allowed to carry on their business, to carry on the cultivation of their fields, and to carry on working in the oil industry without fear of molestation. What is referred to as public opinion in Burma is too often the opinion of the one who shouts the loudest. Let me give an illustration of this point. It will lead up to something I have to say in a moment.
At one time I found myself taking part in a discussion related to the future employment of European professors in Rangoon University. A leading Burmese member of the committee was constantly putting before us the argument that public opinion would not stand for it. At last another Burmese member of the committee, employed in Rangoon University, suddenly spoke up, and said, "I cannot sit here any longer and listen to what is referred to as public opinion. In the course of my duties every year I interview many hundreds of parents, of parents, of potential students and students of Rangoon University, and I am convinced that what the people of Burma want is a good education for their children." He went on—and this is the point—"What is referred to as public opinion is not public opinion at all, but is the opinion of a handful of the politically minded, with the backing of the Burmese Press." That was a most important remark from one Burman to his superior Burmans, and I trust that hon. Members opposite, when they visit Burma, and visit other countries in the Far East, will make quite sure that they get to the bottom of things. There is a danger for those who go to those countries that they go to just those people who have politics ingrained in them, and who often do not represent the true interests of the people.
The true interests of Burma at the present time are the restoration of law and order and, as is becoming increasingly realised amongst the Burmese people, the importation of foreign capital. I believe that the restoration of law and order is by far the more important, and particularly the ending of this most unfortunate civil war which is going on at the present time with the Karen people. It may be it is not for us to suggest how the Burma Government should tackle this question, but following up from my last argument, I ask that the Government consider this question of the continuation of strife between the Burma Government and the Karens. Can we not do something to bring about mediation?
It may be that there will be political objection from the other side, but following on what I have said, I believe that beneath the surface there will be a strong feeling in Burma in favour of patching up this trouble, and if the Gov-


ernment could find any way. without offending Burmese susceptibilities, of suggesting a settlement of that trouble, they would make a great contribution, not merely to the wellbeing of the Burmese people, but towards going forward with this financial contribution.
I believe that the Government, generally speaking, are tackling this question on the right lines. There is no question of pouring money into Burma, unchecked as to its use. I agree with one Member who, in the last Debate, expressed the view that the responsibility for working out their own salvation must be left with the Burmese people themselves, and if we overdo the financing of their needs, we shall be defeating our own object. I believe that our help to Burma should be in the form of limited ad hoc aid. We must keep the door open.
The need in Burma is steadily growing and may continue to grow, and I can see the possibility of a situation developing in which the Burma Government may come to us with readiness to agree to terms which would be acceptable to both of us. So we must keep the door open, because I believe that it is in the association between ourselves and the Burmese, two free, independent peoples, in the forging of a new link between us that there lies the best hope for Burma, the best hope for the Burmese people, and the best hope of holding back Communism in that part of the world.

6.27 p.m.

Mr. Wyatt: It is a pleasure to me on behalf of the whole Committee to be able to congratulate the hon. Member for Cornwall, North (Sir H. Roper) on his maiden speech. It was, I am sure, wise of him to address us on a subject he knows very well; because the House and the Committee always appreciate speeches from people who have singular and peculiar experience of the subjects on which they address us. I should like to say straight away to the hon. Gentleman that I do not for one moment criticise the Burmah Oil Company.
I believe that the Burmah Oil Company was and probably still is one of the best employers in Burma, and it did conscientiously go out of its way to try to improve relations between the British and the Burmans; and improved the education and welfare facilities of its employees to a very considerable extent. I hope the

hon. Gentleman will acquit me of thinking the company in some way reprehensible. I hope also he will acquit me of only getting my views from the violently politically minded in Burma. The main information I have on this particular topic comes from long talks I had with Mr. Lingeman, the Burmah Oil Company's representative in Rangoon when I was there and met him several times last year. I do not think the hon. Member would consider him to be someone motivated by political considerations.
I believe that there are two prime reasons why this guarantee had to 13e given and was rightly given to the Burmah Oil Company during the last few months. One, as my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley (Mr. Diamond) has already pointed out, was that it was vital at that time to do nothing which might make the Burma Government's problems on the law and order side more difficult than they were. If at that time a large number of the employees of the Company, through no fault of the Company, had been thrown out of work it would very much have exacerbated an already difficult political situation and might have made it unmanageable.
On that score alone, this guarantee was justified and fitted into the framework of our general policy in South-East Asia of trying to assist any new Government there. As the hon. Member for Cornwall, North, rightly said, we must not think that it is a hopeless task. It is not a hopeless task, and I think that over the last year there has been a substantial improvement in conditions as against what they were a year ago. It may be a long task and a difficult one, but it is certainly one that should not be given up.
There was, as I understand it, quite another reason for this guarantee and perhaps an even more important reason. It was that in Burma and in other countries in the East there is going to arise increasingly a conflict between local national feeling and foreign-owned industries which operate in those countries. As soon as a country approaches self-government, or acquires self-government, it begins to feel very strongly that it should own and operate at least some of the basic industries of that country. It was the case, I think, that the Burmah Oil Company had some very enlightened


representatives on the spot in Rangoon, who felt very strongly that it would be possible to work out an arrangement with the Burma Government by which some new association could be developed which might even be a model for the whole of that part of the world.
It was with that in mind, I believe, that the British Government said, "Let us have a look at this scheme you are trying to work out. While we are looking at it, please try to keep the work on the oilfields going, and we will give you a guarantee that we will make up your losses during that period, while we consider the wisdom or otherwise of applying the wider scheme which both the Burma Government and the Burmah Oil Company are considering."
I do not want to reveal any details of this scheme because I believe that it has not yet been made public, other than to say that the central idea was that over a period of years the Burma Government would acquire a part-share in that section of the Burmah Oil Company operating in Burma, and that it would gradually learn some of the "know how" and the business side of producing oil and marketing it, and of operating oil companies, which would be of enormous benefit to the Burmans themselves, and also of enormous benefit in promoting good relations between Britain and Burma.
I think that the way in which the Burmah Oil Company handled this matter showed that they were acting with the best possible motives and were doing a great service to both countries, and we certainly have no complaint on this side of the House of the operations of the Burmah Oil Company. Several hon. Members have already pointed out it is absolutely essential to such a scheme, if it is to operate in the future, that there should be some law and order, and during all this time it is quite true that the oilpipe line has been cut off and it has not been possible to get ahead with the re-opening of the oil fields to anything like the extent that was originally desired. So I think that although it is a pity that the British Government have now had to withdraw this guarantee, and it is a pity that both the British Government and the Burmah Oil Company had, at any rate, for the time being to abandon the wider scheme, it was really forced upon them by a number of factors.
One is, of course, that we were substituting for special assistance to the Burmah Oil Company through the Burma Government a general Commonwealth plan for assistance; and the second is that although the Burma Government have been considerably strengthened vis-à-vis the disruptive elements during the last year, the oil pipeline is still not operating; and the third point is that the Burma Government are now in a better position to deal with any labour difficulties that may arise than they were a year ago. On these grounds it is reasonable to put the wider scheme into cold storage.
I think that it was wrong of the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) to say that the British Government do not care about the Burmah Oil Company, as he very emphatically stated. I am sorry that he said that. The rest of his speech indicated that he realised that we were not standing any nonsense on this side of the House on these subjects, and consequently he very much tempered his observations. I think that it was a pity he did suggest that because as far as I know the relations between the British Government and the Burmah Oil Company have been of the friendliest and both have been working towards the same very good end.
I agree with him on this point, however. Whereas it is obviously wrong to try to impose political conditions on another country when offering it a loan of the kind he was suggesting in his earlier speech, when he suggested that they should abandon certain practices of having a State marketing board or bulk buying or anything of that kind, I think it is perfectly right that we should point out to the Burma Government that this rather strange system of settling industrial disputes should be hastened so far as this matter is concerned. As he rightly said, we had been "carrying the can" for the last nine months or more, and there is no reason why we should have to do so longer. I am sure that the Burma Government would listen to representations of that kind which are perfectly reasonable.
As to why we have not heard about this guarantee before, I was under the impression that the general reason was that it had been agreed by all three parties—the British Government, the Burma Government and the Burmah Oil Company—that none of these negotiations


should be made public until the final decision had been reached, because there was a tricky political situation in Burma and a very complicated series of negotiations to go through, and it was not desirable to focus publicity, particularly in Burma, at that time on the negotiations going on. The Government of Burma was having some difficulty in persuading its followers that it was wise to co-operate with foreign industrial interests. I think that on the whole the British Government was right. It was not the intention to keep this secret from the House of Commons for the sake of doing so, and there is nothing sinister in that we have not heard about this guarantee before.
I am sure that no one would go to elaborate pains in keeping secret a matter of £1 million which, although considerable, is infinitesimal compared with the Budget itself, and obviously we must be prepared to accept that the Government had very good reason for not making the guarantee known earlier. We on this side of the House were glad to register the rather more temperate spirit with which the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale approached his second topic for Debate, and I was glad that he did not want to make any complaint about the Government advancing money towards a private enterprise concern and that he wanted to reserve his complaint for money advanced towards State-owned concerns. That is an ideological difference which I can understand coming from him. In general, I am sure the Government have acted wisely in this matter, and I am sure that the Burmah Oil Company have too, and that all three parties in this matter have done their best to help in bringing about law and order.
I should like to make a special plea, because I think that the wider oil scheme has in it the germ of an idea which could be adopted by many other countries in the East, that this scheme be reconsidered as soon as law and order is sufficiently obtained in Burma to allow the pipeline to be re-opened.

6.40 p.m.

Mr. Gammans: The only comment I will make on the speech of the hon. Member for Aston (Mr. Wyatt) is on that portion of it in which he said that the hope of the loan was to keep the oilfields going. If that is the justification for this expenditure, the policy has

failed, because the oilfields have not been kept going; not a trickle of oil has come through the pipeline; no work is going on at the refineries, and the only way one can get to the oilfields today is by means of an air-lift. So the policy has failed. But we are not only being asked to pass a Supplementary Estimate. We are also being asked to approve the policy of His Majesty's Government towards Burma generally in the restoration of law and order. Indeed, we are asked to do more than that, because there is reference in this statement to
Pending other measures of financial assistance.
Our contention is that His Majesty's Government's policy towards Burma has not only been a failure with regard to Burma oil, but has been a failure generally. It has obviously meant considerable financial loss to the taxpayers of this country; it has meant a tragic fiasco for the people of Burma; and it may be one of the main causes of a potential large-scale tragedy for South-East Asia. I do not think that anyone can accuse us of any lack of generosity towards Burma. As the Foreign Secretary told us yesterday, since 1945, in one form or another over £70 million has been advanced or spent by the British taxpayer towards Burma. I need not remind the Committee of the many thousands of British graves in Burma. Today, we have over £100 million worth of British assets in Burma, most of which I think are in jeopardy.
We have criticised His Majesty's Government's policy towards Burma in three respects. To start with, we did not in any way differ from them on the ultimate attainment of self-government by Burma; there was no quarrel on that point. But we did vote against the Second Reading of the Government of Burma Act, because we felt that there were adequate reasons for us doing so. Those reasons were as follows. We thought it was wrong that this country, which had a responsibility towards the people of Burma, should hand the country over in a state of chaos and anarchy. We see that chaos and anarchy continuing today, and it is referred to in this Supplementary Estimate. The second reason why we opposed the Government was that we did not take at its face value the Panglong Agreement


alleged to have been made between the Burmese and non-Burmese people.

The Chairman: I cannot conceive that these matters have any reference to this particular compensation payment, and I therefore hope that the hon. Gentleman will not pursue that line of argument.

Mr. Gammans: I naturally will not do so if you rule me out of Order, Major Milner, but, with respect, I would point out that we are considering the restoration of law and order; and we are also considering a token Vote which suggests that other measures of financial support to the Government of Burma are pending. I would therefore submit that we are entitled to make a general criticism of His Majesty's Government's policy towards Burma where it concerns the question of law and order.

The Chairman: I am sorry, but I cannot agree to a general debate at all. Even if other measures of financial assistance are pending, we cannot deal with them now because they are not before us at the moment. Nor can we deal with the question of the opportunity to restore law and order, which presumably has already passed. The sole question is the ground on which the Government have thought fit to make this compensation payment, and I certainly cannot agree to the whole policy towards Burma being gone into on detail upon this Supplementary Estimate.

Mr. Gammans: But, with respect, are we not entitled, where we have an item which says:
Pending other measures of financial assistance"—

The Chairman: When that question of financial assistance comes before the House, that will be the time to discuss it. This is not the time.

Mr. Erroll: On a point of Order. Surely one of the objects of the compensation payment is to give the Government of Burma an opportunity to restore law and order. The sentence beginning in the second line is one of the objects of the compensation payment, and is not influenced by the subordinate clause which precedes it.

Mr. Ernest Davies: This compensation payment for which a token Vote is being asked is for a period which has already

expired. Therefore, the question of restoring law and order does not come into this, and is in respect of a period during which an attempt was made to restore law and order.

Mr. Dodds-Parker: The whole need for this compensation arose from the fact that there was no law and order because of the relations between the Government of Burma and these other peoples, such as the Karens.

Mr. Gammans: I do not want to go back too far, but I hope, Major Milner, you will allow me to say just this. From what we have seen of His Majesty's Government's policy towards Burma, there was no real safeguard for British interests in that country, and we see here, in the case of the Burmah Oil Company, an example of that. I think that we ought to have some soil of statement from the Government about the present condition of Burma itself, because my information is that the present Government of Burma is wholly unable to maintain law and order, or to put down the dacoits who are ravaging a large part of the country.
So far as I know, there is no traffic on the railways between Rangoon and Mandalay; it is impossible even for there to be river traffic; and the only way to the oilfield is by an air-lift. In other words, it is as if in this country His Majesty's Government could only maintain itself in London, the suburbs of London, the Thames Estuary and Manchester, and that the only contact between London and Manchester were by air; and that all Scotsmen, both at home and in England, were in revolt, with the Welsh in the same position. I think that is a fair analogy with the position in Burma today. My information is that the Government of Burma do not control one-sixth of the country.

The Chairman: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member again, but he really cannot drag in the whole of His Majesty's Government's policy towards Burma for which country, in any event they are not responsible. He must make his remarks appropriate to the particular item. I must ask the hon. Gentleman to confine himself to the question raised by this token Estimate. That is whether it is proper or improper to make a grant to the Burmah Oil Company, which has already


apparently been made, for the purpose of stimulating employment, to give the Government of Burma an opportunity to restore law and order. That is the only question.

Mr. Gammans: That is exactly my point, that they have failed to restore law and order, and I am endeavouring to give the Committee proof that that is so. I hope I may be entitled to point out to the Committee that there is no law and order over a large part of Burma; that the writ of the Government of Burma does not run, except in the large towns; and that therefore this money which has been advanced for that specific purpose has very largely been wasted. Would you rule on that, Major Milner?

The Chairman: I must not be tied down, but if the hon. Gentleman will put the matter somewhat in that form, he may be in order. Hitherto he has not done so.

Mr. Wyatt: Would it be in order if the hon. Member were to try to show that this compensation should not be paid to the Burmah Oil Company?

The Chairman: Yes, I think it would.

Mr. Gammans: If only for obtaining that concession, I am grateful to the hon. Member for Aston.
My other point is shortly this—and I hope this will be in order—that the Government of Burma have failed to allow British interests to maintain themselves in the country. Perhaps here I might quote a speech of the British Ambassador in Rangoon reported in "The Times" on 23rd February, in which he said:
So far little has been done to implement the Government's declared policy in regard to industry and capital.

The Chairman: I am sorry, but I really cannot allow this line of argument. I have re-read the note and the matter is perfectly clear. The United Kingdom Government are guaranteeing the Burmah Oil Company against loss. That is the point to which the hon. Gentleman must address himself. The question is not one of the general condition of Burma, but the grounds on which the Government have thought it proper to guarantee the Burmah Oil Company. The hon. Gentleman must relate his remarks to that

Mr. Gammans: I will conclude then, by saying that this loan has been a failure. It has been a failure because it has failed to effect the purpose set out in the Supplementary Estimate. It is quite obvious that politically Burma is in a state of semi-dissolution, and that we shall be very lucky if the country exists at all as an independent land within the next two or three years. The policy has failed economically, because we have seen Burma, which before the war not only fed itself but was able to look after, with food, oil and raw materials, a large part of South-East Asia, rapidly relapsing into a bullock-cart civilisation. For that reason, the policy of the Government in regard to this particular loan has been a failure. I should like to have suggested, if it had been in order, the conditions which should attach to any future loans that are advanced, because the time has come when the British taxpayer can no longer be asked to pour money into the sieve of Burma.

6.52 p.m.

Mr. R. A. Butler: I think the time has come when we can draw this discussion to a conclusion. I do not think my hon.,Friends will wish to press this matter any further, and we should like to have a few words from the Under-Secretary. I do not propose to add very much to this Debate, except to endorse the excellent maiden speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cornwall, North (Sir H. Roper). He has spent a most useful life in Burma, and his excellent services in the war in denying some of these very services to the enemy are well known to the Committee. He has enhanced an already distinguished reputation in the contribution he has made today.
I had wished to develop this matter rather more fully, but I understand the Ruling of the Chair, is to the opposite effect. I would remind the Committee that we are dealing here with a company that has a first-class record in Burma. In the inter-war period, the production was averaging 18,000 barrels of oil a day, and in the year 1939–40 the export of oil alone from Burma was valued at over £10 million. That is the past glory of the Burmah Oil Company. The present situation is absolutely tragic, both from the point of view of world oil production and from the point of view of the situation in Burma itself.
In view of the Ruling which has been given, I shall confine my remarks to this one point, and that is that the position today in Burma and during the currency of this agreement is one which causes my hon. Friends the utmost anxiety. It is a situation to which the Under-Secretary should address himself. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) has said, however honourable the motive in giving aid to the Burmah Oil Company in assisting employment, it is of no value because the circumstances are such that full and proper advantage cannot be taken of the loan.
I appeal to the Government, in regard to the granting of money which has been made and in regard to their future policy, so to conduct their attitude towards Burma, in company with the Commonwealth countries, that law and order, to which reference is made in this Supplementary Estimate, is re-established, and so that future aid we give, either from the British taxpayer or other sources, may be spent to the best possible advantage. It would be very wrong to allow these Estimates to pass without expressing the great anxiety we feel about the internal situation in the country, despite the aid of the Government and many other high-minded people to improve the situation.

6.56 p.m.

Mr. Ernest Davies: I wish to endorse the closing remarks of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. R. A. Butler). The purpose of this guarantee was to assist in the restoration of law and order in Burma, or at least to prevent the position, if that were possible, from deteriorating through the discharge of large numbers of men from the Burmah Oil Company. The Government are very concerned about the position in Burma, but are satisfied that there has been some improvement during the last 10 months. Any assistance which can be given by this Government, in co-operation with the Commonwealth, will be given. As evidence of that is the loan to which reference has been made, and in regard to which a further statement will be made in the near future.
I think that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale (Mr. Erroll) was a little less than fair to the Government

when he referred to our assistance to the Burmah Oil Company. He said that the Labour Government did not care about the Burmah Oil Company and that we had allowed the position to go from bad to worse. One of the main reasons why this guarantee was given was to enable this very important British interest to be protected, if it were possible to do so. If conditions had improved during the period of guarantee, this important British interest would have been maintained.
The tragedy, and I endorse the word used, is that the oilfields are at present producing an extremely small quantity of oil, as a large section of the pipeline is still cut by those opposed to the Government. As the hon. Member for Hornsey (Mr. Gammans) said, the oil cannot flow down to Rangoon. The purpose of the guarantee was to put off the labour discharges that were threatened by the Burmah Oil Company. It was because it was considered that there would be a serious deterioration in the position if these discharges were made at that time, and because it was thought that it would prejudice any decisions that were to be made on any further proposals, such as that put forward by the Burma Government for acquiring a share in the oil industry in return for a large loan with which they approached the company, that this guarantee was given.
There was a risk taken at the time that law and order would not be restored, and that it would not be possible to bring about the rehabilitation of the oilfields. As it has turned out, the rehabilitation of the oilfields has not been possible. During the period of this guarantee, of which notice of termination was given at the end of last year, labour was employed and considerable work was done in reconstructing the refinery near Rangoon. Some of this work is not wasted. There are some assets there, but it would be a mistake to exaggerate their value as a result of the expenditure of this money.
I think Members will appreciate that the risk was one worth taking at the time. It appeared that there was a possibility at that time of law and order being restored, and the oil industry being got going again. That has not been possible, to the regret of His Majesty's Government. I can quite understand the criticism that has come from some Members in regard to the failure to inform Parliament of this guarantee.
There are extenuating circumstances, however, why the information was kept from Parliament. It was considered that any announcement of this, guarantee at that time would have encouraged disastrously undue speculation in Burma and at home about the Government's future policy in respect of the oil industry. At the same time it might have diminished Burma's own efforts to restore law and order.
In other words, if this guarantee had been announced, it was thought that it would indicate to Burma and the Burmese that far greater assistance was forthcoming than actually was contemplated at that time. It might have prejudiced consideration of future Commonwealth loans and oil ventures to which reference has been made. That was the main reason why Parliament was not informed at the time. It was considered preferable to decide on a Commonwealth loan prior to making an announcement in regard to this guarantee.
I would point out to the Committee that the Burma Government themselves were not informed of the guarantee at the time, and, because of that, conditions certainly could not have been imposed on the Burma Government such as those suggested by the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale. He should realise that this assistance was to the Company and was not to the Burma Government. It was the company which received the guarantee, of which the Burma Government was not aware, and, therefore, it was not possible to say to that Government, "You must do this or that because we are making this guarantee." They are entirely separate entities and cannot be related; but at the same time, in defence of the Burma Government during this period, it should be stated that energetic steps were taken to restore law and order. As I have stated, the military position is, in our view, somewhat improved.
Reference has been made to the terminal payments which will have to be made in one form or another by the Burmah Oil Company. The position is that the company have not been able to carry out their full programme of discharges, since the issue of retrenchment of labour has been referred to the industrial courts because those courts had intervened. Whether this labour can be

discharged or not is before the industrial courts, and the Burmah Oil Company have to keep these men in their employment.
The Government do not consider that they can decide at this particular moment whether there will be a liability on the part of His Majesty's Government to meet these terminal payments. We prefer to leave that to the experts to decide, but we take the point of view that it is not possible for this matter to go on indefinitely. We cannot be subject to an indefinite continuing liability on account of the refusal of the industrial courts to allow these men to be dismissed. We have made representations to the Burma Government for this matter to be solved as quickly as possible in view of our liability. We do not admit liability for these terminal payments, and we seek an early decision on that matter. We are hopeful it will be forthcoming in the not very distant future. It might be pointed out that these terminal payments would presumably have been paid by the Burmah Oil Company whether there had been a guarantee or not.

Mr. Erroll: That is the whole point. A year ago there would not have been an industrial court arbitration, and during 1949 the company were able to dismiss 2,000 men without the excessive terminal payments. The terminal payments only arose because the company operated the guarantee given by His Majesty's Government.

Mr. Davies: That just depends on the date the Burmah Oil Company would have discharged these men had the guarantee not been given. They postponed any discharges contemplated until 7th March, 1949, when our guarantee came in. In other words, in November they proposed to close down on a care and maintenance basis. In practice this did not take place.
I do not think I need deal at any further length with this matter. The guarantee was given after the Burmah Oil Company had spent £6½ million on rehabilitation. We consider that, that money having been spent, and the Burmah Oil Company being such a valuable British asset, it was well worth while to make a guarantee in the hope that we could keep the company operating in Burma, enabling it to rehabilitate itself, and that


it would continue to be a valuable investment for this country. We risked in the event possibly something over £1 million to save that £6½ million and other assets. For the moment, it appears that the £1 million will have to be met out of the taxpayers' money. Some of it remains the property of the Burmah Oil Company, but for the most part the taxpayer will have to meet the bill. We make no defence of doing that, because we consider it was in the circumstances fully justified. Therefore, I would urge the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale to consider withdrawing his Amendment to reduce the Vote.

Mr. Erroll: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Original Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved:
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £1,010,355, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the expenses in connection with His Majesty's Embassies, Missions and Consular Establishments abroad; certain special grants and payments, including grants in aid; and sundry other services.

CLASS VI VOTE 16. MINISTRY OF CIVIL AVIATION

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the salaries and expenses of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, including certain grants and subsidies.

B.O.A.C. (GRANTS)

7.7 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation (Mr. Beswick): Hitherto when I have ventured to say a few words on the subject of civil aviation in this Committee it has been from the more bracing atmosphere above the Gangway, and I feel, therefore, on this occasion that I might properly expect some indulgence from the Committee.
The money sought under this Supplementary Estimate is a token amount only. My noble Friend is placing no additional burden on the taxpayer. Savings in

various directions have been made, which will enable him to meet an additional grant to help cover an increased deficit on the working of B.O.A.C. However, this transfer is a substantial one, and the Committee is entitled to ask for an explanation. I shall, if the Committee wish it, give that explanation under the various heads, and if anyone would like me to answer points later on I shall be glad to try to do so.
The original estimated grant to B.O.A.C. was £3,500,000 and the additional requirement is for £3,057,000. I must say frankly that this will not be the total amount of the Corporation's deficit for the financial year, which has not ended, though it is the maximum which the Exchequer can be asked to meet. An amount of £250,000 of this £3,057,000 is simply a book transfer. It was spent on that purpose for which it was originally voted but under the name of B.O.A.C. instead of B.S.A.C.
There is another item, which though comparatively small, is still most irritating. It is for £207,000 and is an adjustment of the 1946–47 deficiency grant to B.O.A.C. It is largely made up of delayed bills from Government Departments for spares, and other charges by B.O.A.C., carriage of goods and personnel in the early post-war period when immediate accounting was reckoned of less importance than expeditious transport. It is only recently that the need for this adjustment has been brought to light.
The first item in the unforeseen expenditure that has resulted in this deficit is the result of devaluation. I am afraid that devaluation hit the Corporation very sharply. There were immediate increases in overseas station costs, in American type spares, and in fuel taken up in dollar countries. These costs were partially offset by increased earnings, but the net additional increase to the current financial year's deficit is put at £650,000. The biggest and unhappiest item with which we have to deal is the £1¾ million consequent upon the decision to withdraw Tudor aircraft from South American services. This decision, with which no one in the House disagrees was financially calamitous for the Corporation. All the plans had been made for extended services and increased traffic. Ground staffs had been augmented and additional expenditure properly and inevitably in-


curred. Then followed the accident to the "Star Ariel" and the whole pro gramme had to be tom up.
For a time it was contemplated cutting losses and pulling out of the South American area until new machines were available. I am sure it was right not to accept defeat in that way, but the alternative was very costly. Most of the charges on the proposed expanded services still persisted. The obsolescence and insurance costs on the remaining Tudors, for example, still carried on. The expensive crew training had already been carried out, although now completely wasted. To fit out and bring in the old Yorks meant more expense, and although a gallant fight was put up by these machines they could not compete commercially with other modern aircraft against which they flew. Revenue dropped by something round £1,900,000 below the original estimate, a drop of more than 60 per cent. It is easy to lay the blame for this unfortunate business, but I cannot see that anyone can fairly criticise the B.O.A.C. on this Vote for this particular item. I only wish I could say that this Vote represents the end of the bills which will come in on account of Tudor aircraft.
The other major cause for this additional deficit is delay over delivery of new aircraft. It is not only disappointment over new British machines with which the Corporation has had to contend. Of the original six Boeing Stratocruisers due for delivery by March, 1948, only one had been received by November, 1949. In original estimates agreed with the Corporation, it was expected that these machines would be earning money by July of last year. In fact, they completely missed the lucrative traffic of the peak period, and indeed it was the machines that were subsequently bought from Scandinavia for sterling that were put into service in the winter. I suppose I might also mention that fact that the Hermes, the first of which had been promised for July, 1948, is still not operating.
All these delays have not only meant lower revenue than calculated but additional preparatory and planning costs. It is an expensive business to convert air crew to these new types. The Stratocruiser, for example, I am told, costs something like £120 a hour to fly on circuits and bumps, a figure greatly in excess

of what it was in the days when some hon. and gallant Gentlemen opposite were taking their ticket on new types of aircraft. These costs, resulting from delays in delivery in new aircraft types, more than account for the remaining sum which the Department propose to transfer.
All I would say now is that this year, 1949–50, has been a difficult one and, I am bound to say, that the financial results, at any rate, are most disappointing. It would be silly to deny it. Although there are explanations and excuses in abundance, neither my noble Friend nor B.O.A.C. under its present Chairman, Sir Miles Thomas, have for one moment relied on those explanations to secure confidence from Parliament or from the taxpayer. I suppose that I ought to refer to some of the measures that have been taken to keep this figure down to the amount I now bring before the Committee.
There has been during the current year a most determined effort to get the Corporation into proper shape. I believe that the spade work which has been done this year will yield results in the next. There has been a re-organisation designed to give greater decentralisation, and the elimination of one tier of administrative officials. At the instigation of my noble Friend there has been an additional economy campaign which has brought down the staff employed by a substantial figure at a time when output has been going up.
After the first flush of post-war optimism, B.O.A.C. expanded to a peak of 24,624 employees, in 1947. This was reduced by 1st April, 1949, to 18,920. As a result of these further measures, the full results of which are still not to hand, the figure has now been reduced to 16,477. I speak only of B.O.A.C. figures as they are comparable with the original ones I quoted. Let me emphasise that these fewer men are putting out greater work. Probably the greatest cause for hope is the fact that at last we are getting modern aircraft into service. Given the proper tools, the Corporation can, I am sure, do the job. There are already hard figures which support that claim. If questions are asked during subsequent contributions I shall be glad to give the sort of figure which I have in mind.
Some hon. Members opposite will agree that in the past I have myself not been


uncritical of the Corporation. I do not propose to forego that right now. I am sure that my noble Friend will welcome constructive criticism from both sides of the House. Nevertheless, I think I can claim that the Corporation is in better shape and is fitter now than before. It has sweated off a good deal of administrative fat. The Chairman in recent months has not had an easy task, nor a pleasant one, and I hope that we are now near a period when every member of the Corporation can feel a better sense of security, with every prospect of getting on rather than getting out. It is dangerous to prophesy in this field of aviation, but, if we pass this Supplementary Estimate, I think there is every reason for guarded optimism for the future. I think we can now claim that we have got over the financial hump. I hope that the Committee will be able to pass this Estimate.

7.18 p.m.

Air-Commodore Harvey: I should like to congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary upon his appointment. I am sure that with his knowledge of aviation he will be a great success there. I only hope that he will continue to take the same line of approach to these matters as he took when he was critical of the Corporations as a back bench Member of the House. I should like to apologise for my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Bedfordshire (Mr. Lennox-Boyd), who is unable to reply. He is suffering from throat trouble, and I am deputising for him. I apologise for any shortcomings that I may display.
The Parliamentary Secretary referred to avoiding placing a burden on the taxpayer. I am not quite clear what he means by that, because the money that has been saved has been spent in another direction. He said that this is a token sum of £10, but I feel that the money allocated by Parliament should have been spent on items like airfields. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Down, North (Sir W. Smiles) had a question for the Parliamentary Secretary about flying aids purchased at an airport at Manchester. He did not get a very satisfactory reply. I do not think that the Parliamentary Secretary had been adequately briefed on that subject.
Safety must be the first essential. If money has not been spent on proper aids

for that airport it should have been spent. To my way of thinking that is bad planning. Only last summer, in the Pennines, a number of people were lost when a Dakota crashed. The facts about that matter have not yet been published. Surely money voted by Parliament should be spent in that way, and I do not think that the Committee will be satisfied that there should be a saving of money in that direction.
I should like to know about airports in the provinces. Are they to remain the property of the municipalities or are they to be taken over by the Ministry of Civil Aviation? The Committee would welcome a list of the airports actually taken over and of the others that are not going to be taken over, so that we might be clear on the point. Some play was made about the nationalising of airports. Cities like Manchester have been very desirous of keeping their airports. I only hope that these cities will be allowed to continue to operate their airports.
Since the end of the war the export of British aeroplanes has steadily risen. The aircraft industry, in aircraft engines and accessories, has made a great contribution to our exports, particularly to the hard currency areas. In 1949 the figure rose to £34,250,000, which was tremendous. However, I am alarmed now at the rate at which imports are rising. Up to 1949 it amounted to £17,250,000, practically all of it in hard currency. That is alarming and is offsetting the contribution which is being made by the industry. I can understand the difficulties of the Minister regarding late deliveries of aircraft. The four Stratocruisers to which he referred were bought from Scandinavia in sterling, but the other six were bought in the United States at a cost of over £6 million, and the Opposition regretted that contract from the very beginning.
At the time I said it was a great mistake to purchase these Stratocruisers at enormous sums, because it would saddle the country with having to purchase spares, spare engines, propellers and accessories in hard currency for years to come; and this was an aircraft which had not really been proved. I do not want to create alarm about these aeroplanes, but I have read quite recently that on two occasions the engine mountings have fallen out, not in this country but


on American airlines. Is the Minister of Civil Aviation quite satisfied about the performance of the Stratocruiser and its reliability? We should like some information on that subject.
We purchased the 11 Constellations for nearly £3 million. It would have been far better to have continued with the Constellations until the time when the Comet and the other aircraft were in service rather than to have branched out into a new type for which the air crews and engineers had to be trained. Also, 22 Canadairs have been purchased for £4,500,000, a total of £13,500,000 upon American aeroplanes.
The hon. Gentleman referred to devaluation. Of course it has hit the aviation industry. It has hit many other industries, such as the British shipping industry. I should like to know whether his Ministry was consulted by the Treasury about devaluation before it took place to see what the effect might be. It is no good the Parliamentary Secretary coming to this House complaining that his Department is hit by devaluation. Many other firms are in a similar position, and they have to make the best of it and increase their turnover.
As has been explained, the American aircraft were bought primarily to fill the gap created by the most unfortunate accidents and grounding of the Tudors. I do not want to go into great detail about the Tudor. It is a long story. I should however like to make one reference to the Report of the Tudor Inquiry, Command Paper 7478, which says:
The operators put forward requirements for alterations and modifications without apparently paying much regard to their effect on the design of the aircraft and its performance, and the designers accepted these requirements too readily, without first insisting on agreement to the penalties involved.
It goes on to say:
While the primary responsibility for failure to state requirements must rest on B.O.A.C., the ultimate responsibility rested on the Government Departments concerned to ensure that performance requirements were drawn up and transmitted to the constructors. There was a failure to discharge this responsibility.
I do not want to go into that in too great detail, although I think it is in Order because we are discussing why the losses were brought about. It should be remembered that the constructors were placed at a great disadvantage in this matter.
In many cases these expenditures of millions of dollars have been brought about by delayed action and its consequences. There has been far too much centralised control and there has not been very much clear thinking on some of the subjects. In another place the noble Lord the Minister of Civil Aviation made a statement on 2nd February of last year in columns 492 to 495 of the OFFICIAL REPORT. He said that B.O.A.C. had been set a target of £5,500,000 for their deficit in 1949–50, but the noble Lord had announced in another place on 19th January, some two weeks earlier, the withdrawal of the Tudor. If he knew two weeks before that the Tudors were going to be withdrawn, surely he ought to have anticipated the estimated loss or his advisors should have informed him of it.
Now we are being asked to supply another £1,750,000 because of that. These are very large figures. I know that £1,750,000 these days is not much compared with some of the figures which we discuss, but it has to be paid by the taxpayer and we ought not to lose sight of that fact. I do not for one moment think that the noble Lord deliberately misled Parliament. I am sure that he is not the type of man who would do that. I think he was wrongly advised, and he ought to set about his staff for giving him incorrect information.
I want now to refer to the Solent flying-boats which were brought into service in April, 1948, the Corporation knowing perfectly well the relative economics of the landplane and the flying-boat. I know that they changed their minds quite often on that subject, but they ought to have known that. The service was opened with full ceremony and a tremendous Press, and we were led to believe that an era of civil aviation had come to stay. However, in less than two years the service is closed down. It is bad business to inaugurate an expensive service which will have to be closed down in less than two years. The aircraft are left with four-fifths of their life unused. Why was the service ever set up at all? Can we be told the answer to that?
There is also the Princess flying-boat which is being constructed at the Saunders-Roe factory at Cowes. This is a great engineering project in which Britain can and will lead the world, but we are hearing the most dreadful


rumours that the flying-boats may be cancelled and that the construction may not be completed. We should like some assurance that these flying-boats will really be used for the purpose for which they were built. After the merger of British South American Airways with B.O.A.C. we asked for assurances and were given them, but it is very disturbing to the workmen, designers and others in the factory if they are continually to be uncertain because of rumours in the industry. The Minister will be doing a great service to the industry if once and for all he stops these rumours and makes it quite clear that the flying-boats are to be operated. We do not necessarily want to know where, because economics may enter into it.
The Parliamentary Secretary referred to the Hermes. I agree that it is unfortunate that the Hermes airliner is late in being delivered. I have taken the trouble, as no doubt the Parliamentary Secretary has, to check on the point, and I am assured that it is not altogether the fault of the constructors. The hon. Gentleman's predecessor is pulling a face, but I have gone into it. Had the ancillary equipment which was available some three years ago been accepted the aeroplane could have been ready not on time but earlier than it has been. It was agreed to delay it for some time to bring about a better aeroplane. That is my information. It is the first British airliner to have a self-steering nosewheel. I am told that five of these aeroplanes have already been delivered and that their performance exceeds that laid down in the requirements.
I am concerned about this continual placing of orders with the United States, not only from the point of view of expenditure, but because we shall lose a great deal of knowledge of this industry. Americans are clever people. During the war they built transports and we built fighters. It was expedient and had to be done, but at the end of the war they were in a much better position than we were to build air liners.

Dr. Morgan: Dr. Morgan (Warrington) indicated dissent.

Air-Commodore Harvey: The hon. Member shakes his head. Would he like to interrupt and contradict me on this

point? If he knows otherwise, the Committee would like to hear it. The hon. Member knows medicine very well, but I did not know he was interested in aircraft.
The Comet I believe, will be the great saviour of British civil aviation. Its flights are world news almost daily and the Americans are shaken by its performance. Had we struggled along and accepted reduced earnings until it was in service, that would have been the right policy instead of buying Stratocruisers. In 1945, when the Labour Party wrote "Let Us Face the Future," they thought that nationalising civil aviation and having under 200 aeroplanes flying round the world would be a good advertisement for the Labour Government. I do not think any of them really knew the difficulties of operating modern aircraft and they are only now beginning to learn the difficulties involved. We are told every year that the position will get better but it has become only a little better in each succeeding year and we on this side of the Committee are much concerned about the industry.
If we are to have economies in B.O.A.C., why should it be for the Minister of Civil Aviation to bring about an additional economy? Surely that is the job of the Chairman and Managing Director of the Corporation? If they are not up to the job, change them and put in others, but do not bring in piecemeal economies two, three or four times a year. That is unsettling for air crews and everyone else. I ask the Government to give this subject serious consideration in the next few months and see that any cleaning up that has to be done, is done, so that the industry is given a chance to settle down and prove itself, as I am sure it can.

7.32 p.m.

Mr. Rankin: I desire to join with the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) in offering a welcome to my hon. Friend on his appointment as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation. I am sure that I speak not only for this side of the Committee but for all hon. Members when I say that we wish him well and hope that all his landings will be happy. I noticed with interest that my hon. Friend is still prepared to be a little critical of the Corporation and is not to depart entirely from his former rôle.


Consequently, I am sure that he will not be too deeply disappointed if his former mantle, however ill it may fit, falls on other shoulders. While I shall not seek to be unduly critical tonight, I want to offer a word of criticism on one aspect of the problem before us.
I agree with the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield that one of our great problems today is to ensure safety in civil aviation. I would not go so far as to place the solution where he placed it, but would rather take the sentence which my hon. Friend employed when he referred to the cost of modern aircraft as being in the region of £120 per flying hour. In making that statement, my hon. Friend put his finger on the big problem confronting this Committee and himself. We are still faced with the fact that, in spite of all we have done on the mechanical and navigational sides, tragedy occurs from time to time in the air. And now we possess the drastic knowledge that the greatest and most tragic occurrence in the history of civil aviation lies to our credit—or to our discredit.
As far as I recollect, the last time we debated civil aviation we prided ourselves that our record in the air as a nation was better than the record of most nations. We cannot say that tonight because of the tragedy which befell us recently. I think this is due to the fact that our approach has not been the proper one. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Town and Country Planning, when occupying the office of my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, gave me figures time and again pointing out that the accidents per million passenger miles for this nation were smaller than for any nation in the world today. That may be true, but the basis of approach is completely false.
I am not interested in the number of casualties per million passenger miles; I am interested in the fate of the individual passengers travelling in a given aircraft. What is the accident rate there? In almost every case it is 100 per cent. Invariably there are no survivors. If that happened when a railway passenger train is involved in an accident—every passenger killed, or nearly all, and perhaps a few survivors maimed for life—if it happened every time two motor buses came into collision, the conscience of this

country would be so profoundly shocked that there would be no peace until that state of affairs was remedied. What happened when we sent ships to sea loaded in such a way that every individual was carried to his death? It was left to Samuel Plimsoll so to arouse the House of Commons that steps had to be taken to end that state of affairs. We want to see similar action in regard to safety in civil aviation.
Because of the fact that we are aiming at greater and greater speed in the air—which we are bound to do, because civil aviation is still dependent on military aviation—I hope that my hon. Friend will press for freedom to develop this service from the point of view of ensuring the complete safety of passengers. It is nice to know that the Comet can go to Rome in two hours and two minutes—why the two minutes was flung in, I do not know—

Mr. Lennox-Boyd: To be accurate.

Mr. Rankin: —but just as top speed has become greater and greater, so the landing and takeoff speeds have become higher and higher. Because of that, these great new modern machines are controllable only at top speed; they are not controllable when they come down to the lower speeds. While we are able to say that on the navigational side, so far as aids are concerned, and on the power side, we have made wonderful progress, when it comes to the problem of human judgment we slide into the old excuse that it is the fault of the pilot. That covers the multitude of sins arising from our own wrong attitude.

Air-Commodore Harvey: The hon. Member referred to the Comet and then proceeded to speak about safety. I hope he is not inferring that these fast aeroplanes are not safe, because the fact that an aeroplane like the Comet operates in the sub-stratosphere makes it very safe indeed. It would be a disservice to this country if the hon. Member were to give the reverse impression. The Comet has a remarkable record in the short time it has been flying.

Mr. Rankin: I think I made it perfectly clear that, as far as top speed was concerned, there is no danger. It is when these high-powered machines come to the


lower landing speeds that the danger that they are uncontrollable develops, and anything may happen, as has been shown time and time again. We cover that up by the expression "human error of judgment." It is in that factor that the greater percentage of accidents today is located.
It is for those reasons that I suggest to my hon. Friend that an aircraft should be designed—for after all, the Corporations must have some say in the type of machine they are to fly—which would ensure safety in the air by having lower landing and take-off speeds. That would certainly affect the top flying speed of the machine, but it would mean that the passengers are given a safety which is at present lacking. I suggest also that the machine to be built with these characteristics should carry in its airframe built-in crash survivability, which, again, would add to the safety of passengers in the event of an unhappy landing.
Now to my final point. It may be suggested that in matters of development we are bound to the speed of development in other countries. There exists, however, an international civil air organisation, and surely, if we can divorce, as I think we can, the development of civil aviation, which must be bound by considerations of safety, from the development of military aviation, then it ought to be possible to secure agreement amongst the other nations in the civil air organisation to ensure that these characteristics of safety are embodied in every new machine which is used for civil aviation. If my hon. Friend, in company with his noble Friend the Minister, can seek to develop civil aviation in this country along the lines I have suggested, I am certain that in the annals of this House he will win for himself a measure of lasting fame.

7.45 p.m.

Lord Malcolm Douglas - Hamilton: I should like to start by congratulating the Parliamentary Secretary on his very sincere and honest statement. I do not think he is in any way blinking at the facts. One thing which we on this side have in common with him is that we all want to see British airways operating efficiently and leading the world. The only difference is in our method of approach. In civil aviation generally the first things which should be

considered are the needs of the country and the people, and that regulations should cover first and foremost, as the hon. Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin) has said, safety in operation; and secondly, they should guard against injurious competition. Within those bounds, however, civil aviation should be left as free as possible to the men who know how to run it.
I think that the history of the Tudor—I do not want to labour this point; the history is an old one now—shows really that we are suffering from the delayed consequences of over-centralised bureaucratic control in civil aviation. The same may be said of the suggestion which has been made of the consequences of the decisions on the Solent flying boat, in connection with whose disposal I want to make a constructive suggestion. We now have these boats on our hands, and it is important that they should be used. Three years ago the then Parliamentary Secretary said that British European Airways were obliged to undertake services of public utility which were unprofitable. He was challenged to allow charter companies to run these services without subsidy, but at that time he did not agree.
There is today a crying need for a service which could be operated and which would be of immense value to the country as well as being, I am convinced, a profitable concern: that is, a service which would serve the West Coast of Scotland, where there are no landing grounds but where there are ample and good flying boat bases. The Parliamentary Secretary said the other day of the dismantling of the flying boat base at Southampton that as most of it was water anyway, it could not be dismantled. He was quite right, because water forms the greater portion of a flying boat base, and on the West Coast of Scotland we have some excellent ones.
All these possibilities of flying boat services illustrate my case for disposing profitably of the Solent aircraft. The service I have suggested would be of immense social value to the West Coast of Scotland and of immense value in earning foreign currency from the tourist trade in that area. By this means we could link the area, which is now without an air service of any kind, from Sutherland, Ross-shire, the Isle of Skye and Argyllshire to the Clyde. It would


be of tremendous benefit to the whole country and, more than anything else, it would enable the Highlands in time to play their full share in economic welfare. I suggest that the Minister should consider seriously disposing of the Solent flying boats either to B.E.A. for this purpose or to a private operator who is prepared to put these services into effect.
To return to the main point of running nationalised airlines, I am convinced that everybody wants to see the airlines in this country a success, but we on this side are nevertheless convinced that, given freedom, independent operators could revolutionise air transport in the United Kingdom.

7.50 p.m.

Mr. Ralph Morley: I would like to develop, of course not at any length, two points raised by the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey), in the eloquent and very interesting speech with which he opened the Debate from the benches opposite, and by the noble Lord the Member for Inverness (Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton). The first point is the decision of B.O.A.C. to close down the flying boat base at Southampton or temporarily to suspend the activities of that base and to sell the Solents. My remedy for that is not the remedy proposed by the noble Lord. I do not want the Solents to go to Scotland, but to stay in full operation in Southampton.
I also ask the Parliamentary Secretary if the defence position of the country was fully considered when the decision to sell the Solents was arrived at. It will be generally agreed that flying boats can perform a more flexible and a more varied service, perhaps, in times of emergency than land planes are able to perform. If an enemy Power were to occupy the Persian Gulf, we would have to go to the East by way of Mauritius and the Seychelles Islands, and in those conditions it would be necessary to operate a flying boat service which could not be done by a land plane service.
It was shown quite clearly in the last war that flying boats were of great advantage in military operations. I think it is true that flying boats raised the Japanese air blockage on Australia and I think it equally true that flying boats rendered very meritorious service in the Mediter-

ranean and for a time kept the Atlantic route open. If the Solent boats are sold, the only boats which the Royal Air Force have left are the Sunderlands and they are somewhat out of date. From that point of view I think it might be worth while the Ministry reconsidering their decision to sell the Solent boats.
Many passengers prefer flying boats to land planes. They find them more comfortable and, rightly or wrongly, they believe them more safe. I have just been informed by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Mr. J. Paton) that he thinks flying by flying boats is the most luxurious and magnificent form of travel. I understand the excuse for the decision to sell the Solents is on the grounds of economy, but, when first delivered, the Solents were not in a perfect condition for flying and a good deal of alteration and improvement had to be made to them. The total cost of the Solents to the taxpayer has been in the region of £4,500,000. In addition, about £153,000 was spent upon a berth at the flying boat base at Southampton. I do not think the Parliamentary Secretary was altogether correct when, in reply to the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Sir P. Macdonald) at Question Time yesterday, he said that flying boat bases did not cost anything because they were entirely composed of water. That is not altogether the case—

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: Not entirely, but mainly.

Mr. Beswick: I did not say that they did not cost anything, but I said it would be difficult to destroy the water element of the flying boat base.

Mr. Morley: I would point out that at Southampton £153,000 has been spent on the berth and £4,500,000 was spent on the Solents. They are to be sold and I do not suppose for a moment that the sale will realise anything like £4,500,000. I do not know to whom we are going to sell the Solents but, seeing that this country is abandoning these flying boats, people in Southampton are wondering where the economy comes in under these conditions. The Solent flying boat has never had a really fair chance to operate at the most economical cost. It has only been operating with 10 boats out of a possible 20. If the whole 20 boats had been operated, there would have been


a considerable spreading of overhead charges which would have made the running of these boats more economical than it has been in the past. At the same time the running costs of the Solents have been gradually reduced during the past few years, until now it is claimed that the Solents can be run at £100 per flying hour.
As a matter of fact, the operational costs of the Solent are less than those of the Hermes, with which it is proposed to be replaced. The Hermes has no commercial record at all and no one knows what its performance would be under commercial conditions. It is not a very fast plane and not altogether up to date. If the Hermes is run instead of the Solent on the route to South Africa, the Hermes will be in competition with Sabena and K.L.M., both of which are faster than the Hermes. South Africans, who form a large proportion of the passengers flying to South Africa, have no very patriotic leanings towards this country and are not likely to prefer a plane because it is British. They will prefer a faster plane, and it is the K.L.M.

Air-Commodore Harvey: Will the hon. Member say what exactly is the difference in speed?

Mr. Morley: I have not the precise figures.

Air-Commodore Harvey: The hon. Member is not being fair to this aircraft. Unless he can give the performance, I do not think he is quite playing fair with the British aircraft.

Mr. Morley: I am sorry if I have made a mistake, but my instructions are that the K.L.M. is faster than the Hermes and, from the point of view of speed, passengers would prefer K.L.M. to the Hermes. From another point of view South African passengers, who are mainly of Dutch origin or descent, might have a sentimental reason for preferring K.L.M. planes.

Mr. Lennox-Boyd: Perhaps the best way to help the Solent is not to discredit the Hermes.

Mr. Morley: I am in this position; the Solent is to be displaced by the Hermes. The reason given for substituting the Hermes for the Solent is that the Hermes

is more economical and likely to be more successful from the commercial point of view. I am trying to adduce reasons why it is not likely to prove more successful from a commercial point of view.
I ask the Parliamentary Secretary if he can give any definite assurance in regard to the future of the Princess flying boats, which are a magnificent job. They are one of the best-ever achievements of British engineering, but we have not had anything definite as to what is to be done with them, on what routes they are to be flown and when they are to be flown. I believe that when they are put into operation they will make history in civil aviation owing to their speed and the large number of passengers they can carry.
I wish to refer to the unemployment position which will arise in Southampton from the decision to sell the Solents and close down the Southampton airbase. We are somewhat apprehensive as to the future of employment in Southampton because there is a threatened redundancy in Southampton Docks when the summer is reached. We do not at all like the prospects of having another 1,000 or so men added to the number of unemployed ill Southampton through the closing down of Southampton Airport. Of course, I know that some alternative employment is likely to be offered to some of these men, but it will be offered in other towns and the housing difficulty will arise. Very few of them will be able to take the alternative employment offered because of the lack of housing accommodation, and my fear is that these men will drift into other trades, that their skill and experience in this very specialised occupation will be lost to the nation and will not easily be regained should a time of emergency arise.
The opinion is freely expressed by those who are employed at the Southampton Marine Airport that there is prejudice against flying boats in some high quarters in B.O.A.C., and a tendency to put land planes before flying boats. It is suggested that both land planes and flying boats are required in B.O.A.C., that it might be well to have a flying boat of intermediate size compared with the Princess and the Solent and to put the flying boats under a separate executive committee with a chief who is really interested and enthusiastic about flying boats and their development. I hope that even at


this late hour the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to give me some reassurance on these points.

8.2 p.m.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Walter Smiles: I should like to take up the question of flying boats which my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness (Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton) mentioned in a very good speech. That speech aroused in me the hope of flying boat excursions up the West Coast of Scotland, when I might hope, at last, to be able to visit Staffa and Iona, which I have never yet been able to do.
The first question I wish to raise concerns staff reductions. About two years ago I asked the former Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation about some of the women and girls employed on the staff and urged that they should be made established civil servants with a pension. He said that he was not able to do that at that time. Some of those girls have since had reason to be grateful to the hon. Gentleman because they have left the Ministry of Civil Aviation. They took examinations to enter the Civil Service—one whom I know passed out top—and due to the hon. Gentleman's refusal to make them established civil servants in his Ministry, they have done much better for themselves.
The question of the number of staff to be affected by reduction may create a dangerous position. The numbers had to be reduced, of course. We could not have the money of the Ministry and the tax-prayers being wasted all the time, but I hope that this process is nearing its end. I know personally many of the staff concerned, and I hope that these men and women, who have served the Ministry very well, can now took upon their job as a permanency.
The question has been raised of excursion fares. Whether we are considering flying boats or land planes, the objective is to fill the planes for each trip. It has been suggested to me that the Corporations do not make sufficient reductions in their fares either in the slack season or midweek. Such a reduction might be possible on some services which operate on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday each week. If the Parliamentary Secretary will analyse the position, I believe he will find that seats are often vacant on those services, and it might be pos-

sible to make a small reduction in fare and fill the plane.
The inability of the British aircraft manufacturers as yet to produce, in commercial quantities, a first-class aeroplane since the war has been very disappointing to every member of the Committee. The first name that comes into my mind is that of Short and Harland of Belfast, who last year produced four seaplanes with which a service is being operated at present between Australia and New Zealand. I understand that these seaplanes are operating most effectively and efficiently. I believe that this type is called the Pegasus. We all realise that the Tudors had to go, in view of their record. I hope the time is coming when we shall have a British aircraft produced in the same numbers as the Dakota which, whether known as the Dakota or the Douglas or the D.C., has been a wonderful "bus" in its time. I hope the time is coming when either the Hermes or the Comet will succeed it with a similar record.
Mention has been made of the question of accidents. I was surprised that, in connection with the accident that took place near Ringway Aerodrome, Manchester, in August, 1949, the report and the finding upon it, are only now in print. All of us would be interested to know the reason for that accident. I have spoken to pilots who have to fly by beam in bad weather and they tell me that these beams are not yet technically perfect, that in some places even the fact of a wrought-iron gate being open or closed would make a difference to the beam. I hope with the publication of that report all of us will learn more about that subject. In the case of one report, the Minister disagreed with it after it was published. It might be advisable for the Minister—

The Deputy-Chairman (Colonel Sir Charles MacAndrew): The hon. and gallant Member's remarks are very wide of what is contained in this Supplementary Estimate.

Sir W. Smiles: The question of accidents has been raised by two previous speakers, but I will leave that subject, expressing the hope that these approaches, especially at Ringway Aerodrome, Manchester, will be perfected as soon as possible.
During the past five years no one has been very critical in civil aviation Debates. Members have felt that the Ministry and the aeroplane manufacturers had not had a fair chance since the war to catch up with the Americans. I believe that in future the House will be critical, and I hope that the Ministry and manufacturers will do so well that they will deserve no criticism.

8.8 p.m.

Mr. Grimond: I feel that if civil aviation is to pay and become a really prosperous and soundly based industry it must make itself more popular and break down the feeling that air travel is a matter only for the very rich and is really a luxury form of travel. We must create a habit of air travel which has perhaps been lacking in this country up to now. The hon. and gallant Member for Down, North (Sir W. Smiles) referred to the possibility of cutting mid-week fares, which would do something to encourage travel at that time. Now that transport is largely under State control of one form or another we should also be able to make sure that railway and air services, for example, are closely integrated. We must get rid of the feeling that one has to go to London to start one's air journey. The question of aerodromes enters into that aspect of the matter.
I feel that a great deal of attention should be paid to the improvement of aerodromes all over the country, and that this should not merely be done at one or two main centres. In my constituency, an island constituency, there grew up a great habit of air travel among ordinary people through the improving of the services and the spreading of landing grounds throughout the islands. Some of the services have had to be withdrawn and I would ask my hon. Friend to consider whether he cannot do something to improve and extend the services—

Mr. Beswick: I should like to give the information to the hon. Gentleman but am I not right, Sir Charles, in thinking that this Debate should really be confined to matters appertaining to the British Overseas Airways Corporation?

The Deputy-Chairman: I was just on the point of stopping the Chief Liberal Whip.

Mr. Grimond: I was merely trying to make the point, as an example, that the public would respond to better services by this Corporation.
I feel that the air services of this country are still largely in the pioneer stage, and we should like some assurance from the Parliamentary Secretary that every encouragement will be given to pioneers who have new ideas, both in the Corporation and in industries concerned with the design of aircraft. We have had suggestions today about the use of flying boats which I feel are very valuable. We know that in the past, perhaps we have not been very generous to pioneers who have done a great deal to build up the air services of this country, both as servants of the Corporation, or as independent people running charter flights or in other ways. We are still in the pioneer stage and we must give as much help as possible to people who have such ideas to put before us.

8.11 p.m.

Group-Captain Wilcock: I also wish to offer my congratulations to the Parliamentary Secretary who is not only a personal friend, but a pilot. His experience will I am sure help him tremendously in the problems he will meet in his new office.
I have always had great sympathy with the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the Parliamentary Secretary and the boards of the Corporations. If they make a loss, there is a heap of criticism from hon. and right hon. Members opposite. If they endeavour to prevent a loss by making economies, getting rid of staffs and shutting down bases, again there is plenty of criticism from hon. Members opposite. It must be quite a difficult life which they have to lead. I want to add to their difficulties tonight by endeavouring to persuade them not to make any economies of a transport nature on the South American route. If they are looking for places to make economies, there may be something there to attract them, but I believe that in the long view it would be a great mistake.
There has been built up on that route and in that community of South America a very high reputation for British organisation. The fact that it was British South American Airways does not matter; it was British Airways. There


are many people in the Caribbean and in South America whom we, as a trading nation, would be very short-sighted to lose as customers. I was over that route in the last few weeks and I was astonished to find the warm feeling towards British aviation in that area. I hope that the Minister or the board of British Overseas Airways will not think that it would be an economy to close any part of this route or to withdraw the organisation. I feel sure that it would be far from an economy and that it would be extremely short-sighted.
The noble Lord the Member for Inverness (Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton) spoke about operating flying boats to Scotland, and I think that that is an excellent suggestion. But will hon. and right hon. Members opposite mind if that adds a million or two to the deficiency of B.O.A.C. operations? It is the right thing to do, and in the same way, it is the right thing to continue our efforts in the South American sphere, although it will cost money. We shall lose money by so doing.

Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton: May I say that the point I wanted to make was that the suggestion be investigated, not that we should rush into it with the object of making a loss.

Group-Captain Wilcock: The noble Lord knows as well as I do that it would be very difficult economically to operate flying boats in this country, although it might be a good thing to do so from the point of view of the industry. I believe that there is a future in flying boats, but it will cost money. Are we prepared to accept the fact that it will cost money? Flying boat bases are very expensive, even though they consist largely of water. There is the question of transportation and lighters and so on and it is a costly business, but I should be extremely sorry to see them go.

Sir Peter Macdonald: Is not it equally costly to build 3,000-yard runways of concrete, which cost millions of pounds? With a flying boat base we have a base laid down for us by nature.

Group-Captain Wilcock: I do not think that there is any comparison. A flying boat base must be in an area where it is out of the way of shipping and so on, and it must be in sheltered waters.
All these things must be considered in connection with a flying boat base; whereas a land base, once it is put down, is fit for operation probably for 300 or more days out of the 365. I do not think that the two things can be compared. I would support the suggestion with regard to flying boats, but will hon. and right hon. Members opposite accept the cost of these uneconomical aircraft without offering criticisms—from their very high knowledge of operating aircraft—every time a public corporation loses money?
The hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey), who has a wide experience of operating aircraft, made one remark upon which I must comment. He talked about the Labour Government losing money operating aircraft. The Labour Government do not operate aircraft; it is the public corporations, including men with flying experience, who operate the aircraft. If they cannot operate them economically, we in the House must take the responsibility for the loss. We cannot have it both ways.
I said that I was going to make it more difficult for the Ministry. I ask them to go on operating on the South American route and to keep the passenger handling facilities open, although it will cost us money, because I am sure that in the long run it will be worth while. In the Same way, I support flying boats being operated to Scotland; but that will cost money, and we must realise it and give the Corporation support in this matter,

8.18 p.m.

Mr. Mikardo: I think it would be generally agreed that we have had a thoughtful non-partisan and serious Debate. Perhaps the atmosphere in which we have debated this difficult subject, the consciousness which both sides of the Committee clearly have of the difficulties facing the Corporation and the desire of both sides of the Committee to assist in overcoming them, are due to the thoughtful and equitable speeches with which this Debate was opened; both by the Parliamentary Secretary for this side of the Committee and the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) for the other side. Indeed, if I may say so without offence to the hon. Member for Mid-Bedfordshire (Mr. Lennox-Boyd)


I thought, while listening to the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield, that the Committee had not been robbed by the accident which temporarily made silent the hon. Member for Mid-Bedfordshire and projected the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield on to his own Front Bench.
There was perhaps one exception to the atmosphere of non-partisan helpfulness in which the Debate has been conducted, and that was contained in the earlier part of the third successive maiden speech of the hon. Member for Inverness (Lord Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton) who clearly has not totally recovered from the hurly-burly of the election contest. He allowed himself one or two of the standard platitudes which he no doubt used with great effect upon his electors in Inverness about bureaucratic over-centralisation and all the standard jargon of the anti-Socialist doctrinaires. He was very vehement about these things, and I hope that I am not being impertinent if I suggest in all friendliness to the hon. Member, that he will enrich our Debates on Civil Aviation even further when he allies knowledge to his vehemence. I hope that I may remind him without offence that this nationalisation of the British Overseas Airways Corporation which he so wholeheartedly condemns, was not carried out by any Labour Government. It was carried out before the war.

The Deputy-Chairman: I do not think that we can discuss nationalisation on this Vote.

Mr. Mikardo: With the very deepest respect, which anyone must have who has sat under your guidance, Sir Charles, I suggest that the hon. Member has said that the loss—and hence this Vote—was due to nationalisation. I am merely pointing out that, if that were so, he must make his case against the wicked gentlemen on his side of the Committee who were guilty of this vile act of nationalisation in 1939.
There are two points upon which I should like to comment. My hon. Friend the Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin), and some succeeding speakers, referred to the question of accidents. On this point I think that my hon. Friend was wrong. He said that in previous Debates we had discussed the accident rate of

British aircraft and that we had then said that the accident rate of this nation was the lowest in the world. He regretted that we could not now say that, because of the regrettable accident which was costly in lives which took place a week or two ago.
It is not sensible to talk about the accident rate of the nation. We are discussing the British Overseas Airways Corporation, and the magnificent record of comparative freedom from accidents which the Corporation has, cannot be blotted out by the fact that a private enterprise company, which may not measure up in its work to the standards of the Corporation, has been so unfortunate as to have a grave accident. I think that it is right to say—and if I am wrong I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will correct me—that it is still as true now as it was when it was said by his predecessor some time ago, that there is no large airline anywhere in the world—

Air-Commodore Harvey: On a point of Order. The question is sub judice, with a public inquiry to be held and it is most unfortunate that these remarks should be made when everybody else has avoided the subject.

Mr. Mikardo: I am referring to the freedom from accidents of the British Overseas Airways Corporation.

Mr. Lennox-Boyd: This is a matter which touches some people's personal happiness very deeply. There have been three fatal Tudor crashes. Two have happened under a Government Corporation and one under a charter company. It is undesirable to refer to them at all, but it is most ungenerous and inaccurate for the hon. Gentleman to attempt to suggest that this happens exclusively in charter concerns.

Mr. Mikardo: If I had suggested that, that would be so; but the hon. Gentleman really must not be so touchy in refinding his voice. If he is anxious that one should not cause unhappiness, he ought not to have interrupted me when I was about to ask the Parliamentary Secretary to confirm the fact, which I believe is still true, that no other major airline in the world has a freedom from accidents as good as the British Overseas Airways Corporation. I should have


thought that even hon. Gentlemen opposite would have found some consolation in that and that they would not get "het up" about it. I was in the middle of that very sentence—as the hon. Member will confirm if he looks at HANSARD tomorrow— when he interrupted.
The point I want to make is that this very high record of freedom from accidents in B.O.A.C. is a costly business. I beg hon. Gentlemen to realise what is the connection in the terms of the economics of aircraft operation, between the freedom from accidents and the deficit, the bill for which we are being asked to approve now. No one in this Committee would advocate skimping the safety, the repair and maintenance and the overhaul services of our airways Corporations, and hence endangering lives, in order to save money. I am sure we shall all be agreed that the best salesman for any airways corporation is a good safety record. We should all be agreed, too, that there is no price which one can pay for lives. But let us bear in mind that there is another side to the matter and that we get this magnificent record of freedom from accidents by a standard of servicing, maintenance, repair and overhaul which is unequalled anywhere in the world and which really does cost a great deal of money.
I have the opportunity of seeing some of this work at first hand. I am sure that hon. Members would be most impressed at the thoroughness, the Meticulous care, and the sparing of no trouble and expense which is involved to ensure that the aircraft of the Corporation fly with the greatest freedom from the risk of accident. I say at once that we ought to bear in mind that some of this Vote—it is impossible to say how much—is for the cost of additional safety in British aircraft. Therefore, we ought not to begrudge it for a moment.
The only other point upon which I wish to comment has also been raised by a number of hon. Members. It will be clear to anyone who has listened to the Debate that the connection between the welfare of British aviation and the welfare and efficiency of the British aircraft manufacturing industry is very close indeed. If we are to fly British, as we are all anxious to do at the earliest possible moment, and if at the same time we are

to put the Corporations on a paying basis, it is necessary that the British aircraft manufacturing industry, which stands behind both the R.A.F. and the civil flying services, should be at a very high peak of efficiency.
I doubt whether anybody, even the most ardent defender of that industry, would say that it is at present running at a very high peak of efficiency. I de not want to be controversial about this. The industry has had to face very grave difficulties. The change-over from manufacturing under war-time conditions to manufacturing under peace-time conditions was very difficult. It had to be made by the British manufacturers at a time when manufacturers in some other countries were not facing anything like the same difficulties, because even during the war they manufactured civil types, or so-called military types which were very little different from civil types.
Nevertheless, I think it is not being ungenerous to say that in some respects the British aviation industry has been badly let down by the British aircraft manufacturing industry. I tremble to think what would have happened if the story of the Hermes had been the story of a publicly-owned rather than of a privately-owned enterprise. If indeed the continual promises which were made, broken, made again, broken, remade and rebroken; if this sad story of a continued failure to carry out promises, a continued failure to take into account even the most readily forseeable contingencies in the development of these aircraft, had been the story of a publicly-owned industry, the amount of scream that would have gone up from hon. Gentlemen opposite, through the Press of the country, would have been most formidable.

Air-Commodore Harvey: Why does the hon. Member refer only to the Handley Page Company's Hermes and say nothing about the Stratocruisers, which are a year late in being delivered?

Mr. Mikardo: I do not say anything about that. I do think that two blacks do not make a white, however.

Sir P. Macdonald: rose—

Mr. Mikardo: Perhaps I may first reply to the hon. and gallant Member for


Macclesfield. The hon. and gallant Member must not let himself down by the "I am bigger than you or you are bigger than me" type of argument. If we are let down by the American aircraft manufacturers in what everybody agrees is a temporary phase in America, that is no reason why we should not all hope that the British manufacturers will stop letting down the British aviation industry. Let us not fool ourselves about this. Looking after British airlines is not a high priority with American aircraft manufacturers. It ought to be a high priority with British aircraft manufacturers, but it does not seem to be a high priority with them. There are some firms in the industry doing magnificent work. De Havilland and the Comet have already been referred to and I am sure we have all been thrilled by the excellent work they have done.

Sir P. Macdonald: Before the hon. Member goes on about one particular company and one particular type of aircraft, will he tell the Committee how many modifications were imposed upon this firm and that particular type of aircraft by the Government and by the Ministry of Supply in the course of its construction?

The Deputy-Chairman: I hope the hon. Member will not do that. It would be out order.

Mr. Mikardo: As always, Sir Charles, I bow to your Ruling. I am not trying to slit anyone's throat. I do appreciate the difficulties which they and other firms have had. What I am trying to point out is that a large part of this Vote which we are discussing today is in the nature of a disguised subsidy to the British aircraft manufacturing industry. Perhaps it is inevitable that that should be so. Under modern conditions, in which aircraft become obsolescent and even obsolete very quickly indeed, and when numbers of aircraft are required, it is very difficult to run an aircraft manufacturing industry at all without having a subsidy from somewhere, and all over the world both aviation and aircraft manufacture are being heavily subsidised and are making losses.
Let us be clear about this. We may criticise as much as we like the British Airways Corporations. If any of them had been listening to us today they would have come to the conclusion that they are nobody's sweethearts. Hon. Members

opposite have criticised them. Hon. Members on this side of the House have criticised them. Even the Parliamentary Secretary does not altogether break a lance in their defence. But when we criticise them, let us bear in mind that the bill they have presented is partly a bill for themselves and partly a bill for other people. The price we are being called upon to pay today is to some extent the price of maintaining in the British aircraft manufacturing industry a potential which can be rapidly expanded for war purposes if, unhappily, that should ever be necessary—a potential which to some extent uses civil aviation as its test tube, its place for trying out these ideas. In many ways these losses represent money paid by way of a subsidy to the manufacturing industry.
As I have already said, there are many difficult problems about this industry and, as I have also said, it is a realisation of these problems which has prompted the constructive tone of this Debate. It is my earnest desire that this industry in the future, as at present, will continue to give the maximum help, without any undue spirit of partisanship, to the Parliamentary Secretary and even to the boards of the corporations in the very difficult task they have of ensuring that the British aircraft industry is an expanding one, a safe one and a successful one.

8.34 p.m.

Mr. Beswick: I should like, first, to thank those hon. Members who gave me their good wishes. I am sure they will join with me in paying tribute to my predecessor in this office whose helpfulness we all greatly appreciated. I agree with what was said by the hon. Member for Reading, South (Mr. Mikardo) about the way in which this Debate has been conducted. I am grateful to those hon. Members who have made so many interesting suggestions, and I would also agree that the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield (Air-Commodore Harvey) opened the Debate in a very reasonable way. I should like, however, to take up one or two points which he made.
First, there was the suggestion that he made that some of these savings that my noble Friend has been able to make in the past year have been at the expense of safety. It would be out of order for me to go into details of how these savings


have been made, but I assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that they have not been made at the expense of safety, and that it is quite wrong to suggest that it is only on the ground of expense that we have not as yet replaced the S.B.A. system at Ringway. I would say also to the hon. and gallant Member for Down, North (Sir W. Smiles) that it is a little unfortunate to talk about that accident at Ringway before the findings of the court have been published.
Now I should also like to mention one other thing about which the hon. and gallant Gentleman spoke, the question of the Tudors. I refuse to be drawn on this matter of the history of the Tudors, but I cannot allow this myth of governmental interference to develop. It was not because of governmental interference that there were all those difficulties over the. Tudor aircraft. I know very well what the hon. and gallant Gentleman read out, but there were many other remarks that were made by those two reports, and I think it is wrong to emphasise the one which the hon. and gallant Gentleman read out. In any case, those items to which he made reference were very minor, interior items and did not relate to the fundamental change in design, which was the real cause of the difficulty.
I was asked about the Stratocruisers and the service they were giving to B.O.A.C. There have been teething troubles with the machines, but I can say that the Corporation has been able to identify the cause of those troubles, and we have not had the same difficulties with them as, the hon. and gallant Gentleman apparently heard, the American companies have experienced. I should like to say another thing about the Stratocruisers. If I say much about them I shall have quoted against me something I said two years ago when I suggested we ought to have Constellations instead of Stratocruisers. However, it is a fact that the people who are now operating them, who have brought them over and put them into service, have all the facts and operating data at their disposal, and they are confident that with these machines they can do better on the North Atlantic route than they could have done with Constellations. I emphasise the fact that we shall be competing against American companies using this particular machine; and, after all, in other

contexts we are told that American air line companies have a commercial instinct that we should follow.
With regard to the deficit of the Corporation, I think that the hon. and gallant Member for Macclesfield was right when he said that my noble Friend had no wish to mislead Parliament when he presented last year's figures. He had no wish to do so, and he did not in fact mislead Parliament. He made it quite clear, with his characteristic frankness, when he produced those targets on 2nd February last year, that they were likely to be upset by the accident—or the consequences of the accident—that had taken place only a few days earlier. Again, in this Chamber my predecessor referred to the operational changes which would result from this Tudor disaster. If anyone wishes to suggest that there have been any other attempts to mislead the country or Parliament about the way things were going with B.O.A.C., I would refer them to the very frank statement made at the beginning of this year, before the election, by the Chairman of the British Overseas Airways Corporation.
Many hon. Members in various parts of the Committee have asked me about policy with regard to flying boats. It seems an extraordinary thing that when any opinion is expressed or a decision is made either way about flying boats, almost by convention we say "It is due to prejudice." I have looked at the figures in relation to the Solents, and there is no prejudice about this matter at all. If these machines were to operate profitably, even so far as the operation was concerned, on the figures supplied to me they would have to be full every time they flew, and three people would have to be sitting on the wings and paying full fares. It would only be on this basis that we could break even on the overall operating costs of these flying boats. I have something to say later about the savings which have resulted from the substitution of more modern machines along the Far Eastern routes.
I might mention—if I can do so and still remain in Order—that some of the savings which have enabled us to offset this deficit, did in fact flow to the Department as a result of the closing down of the marine bases on the Far Eastern routes. May I answer a further question? If these machines were not


economic, why were they put into operation comparatively recently? I think that is a fair question, but then we should also ask ourselves: If the Solents were not used along these routes at that time, what other aircraft were available? The answer is, None at all.
Tudors have been mentioned. Does anyone say that we should have put Tudors along these routes? We could have gone to the Americans and tried to buy some aircraft with dollars, but we have been criticised today already for buying too many American aircraft. The fact of the matter was that if these routes were to be maintained it was essential to use the only machines available, and they were flying boats. They served us well. They are most acceptable to the travelling public, but they are not economic to use. May I say about flying boats generally that I agree with the statement made that so far the flying boat, as a flying boat, has not been given a fair chance. It is not until we get something over 200,000 1b. all-up weight that we can get to an economic stage for flying boats. The Princess flying boat has I think, something in the order of 300,000 lb. all-up weight, and it is a very different proposition.
As the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Sir P. Macdonald) knows, I have been down to his constituency once or twice, and I agree with what has been said from behind me about these really beautiful ships that are being built in the yards of the Isle of Wight. I can say that these new flying boats are going to be put into operation, but exactly on what routes we cannot say at the moment. It is the intention, however, when they come along, and after they have been tried, tested and proven, that they shall be put into operation, and I personally look forward to the day when I shall be given a flight in one of these big flying boats. The hon. Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin) made some very interesting observations about safety, but I do not think I should be in order if I were to follow him in his line of thought.
May I say, in relation to the possibility of using Solents along the West Coast of Scotland, that it is a most attractive proposition? I do not think that we can rightly complain of the deficits of these Corporations and expect them to take

on this particular task, but I would suggest to the hon. Member that if there is anyone who would like to put up a proposition to the Air Transport Advisory Council I am sure that it would be considered, and we would be very glad to find purchasers for these flying boats. As far as our case is concerned, it would tend to be in support of the application, although with that support there would be no undertaking to provide bases round the West coast of Scotland.
My hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Morley), also had something to say about these flying boats, and I am sure we all admire the persistence with which he presses the claims of his constituents in this matter. I must repeat, however, that we are asked to reduce the deficit of these Corporations, and that we are doing that, but it is impossible to bring down this deficit if we have to fly these uneconomic machines. As for the possible redundancy, already the appropriate trade unions have been consulted, and whatever is done will be done in conjunction with and in agreement with the appropriate bodies.
I now wish to say a few words about the prospects of new machines, and to refer to the change that has taken place along some of the routes, giving a further reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Itchen. These figures which I now give support the claim I made that the Corporation can do an economic job if it is given the proper tools. On the Kangaroo route to Australia, for example, the substitution of Constellations for Hythes was estimated to yield a saving of £1 million a year, and expectations so far have been more than realised. On the Far East route, where Argonauts have replaced the Plymouth flying boats, a saving at the rate of £750,000 a year is already being shown. A big operational deficit is again turned into a substantial surplus. I would mention in relation to the Argonauts that I think it is wrong simply to describe them as "dollar aircraft." They have got British Rolls-Royce engines, and I can say that all the way down the route these Argonauts are making friends, and the British engines are giving excellent service.
Altogether, on four principal routes on which the Argonauts and Constellations have been introduced, an operating


deficiency of £149,000 in the last quarter of 1948 has been turned into a very useful surplus of £340,000 in the same quarter of 1949. I would stress, too, the nature of the Kangaroo route, because I think it is especially encouraging. Along that route we are now flying the same aircraft type as our Australian comrades in Qantas, and we share the same ground facilities. This was the ideal Commonwealth co-operation at which we originally aimed. It is a good thing financially and politically. I hope that the day is not too far distant when this same sensible co-operation will extend not only on that Commonwealth route but along all other Commonwealth routes. I join my voice with those of other hon. Members in saying that I also should like to see these routes flying, not only the British flag but the flag flown by British aircraft, and I can say that the encouraging progress of the Comet, so far does much to sustain that hope.

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved:
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £10, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the salaries and expenses of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, including certain grants and subsidies.

CLASS IX VOTE 2. MINISTRY OF FOOD

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £13,880,400, be granted to His Majesty to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the salaries and expenses of the Ministry of Food; the cost of trading services, including certain subsidies; and sundry other services.

IMPORTED MEAT SUPPLIES

8.50 p.m.

Mr. Thornton - Kemsley: I beg to move that Subhead H (Trading Services (Net)) be reduced by £100.
In asking the Committee to turn its attention from Civil Aviation to the Trading Supplementary Estimates of the Ministry of Food, it is my pleasant duty to congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his assumption to office. He brings to his new office a recognised ability, a human approach and a charm of manner

which have contributed to the regard in which he is held in all quarters of the House. We on these benches wish him well with his national house-keeping.
If the Minister has inherited some troubles from his late but not lamented predecessor which he would rather be without, an empty larder is not one of them. His problem is not so much to secure sufficient stocks to meet the rations, but to store the supplies to which he has fallen heir. The Chancellor of the Exchequer last week brushed aside an increase in the Estimates of the Ministry of Food on the grounds that stocks held had increased by something like £24 million more than was estimated. It would be very much easier to follow the arguments of the right hon. and learned Gentleman if the Committee could be told exactly what stocks were held and the value of those stocks. We on these benches have repeatedly pressed that stocks of food should be divulged. We have it on the authority of "The Economist" that stocks of wheat are something like twice as heavy as they were a year ago, that stocks of bacon, cheese and butter are more than three times as heavy, and that other stocks, with the exception only of sugar, have increased by something like 25–50 per cent.
I hope that the Minister is not going to follow his predecessor's practice of refusing to divulge food stocks to the House and the country. The Ministry of Supply and the Board of Trade publish stocks of the commodities for which they are responsible, and in which they trade, in the Monthly Digest of Statistics. The late' Minister of Food told us a year ago that publication of stocks of food would not be in the public interest. Why should this be the case? It is possible for traders to work out stocks that are held in the country. Meat stocks, for instance, must be known to a great many people. It is quite easy to work them out from ascertainable figures of imports, home slaughterings and consumption. There would be no difficulty whatsoever for, let us say, the commercial attaché at the Argentine Embassy to work out these sums for himself. I can see no reason whatsover for a refusal to divulge the stocks, and I ask the Minister of Food to let us know what they are.
What is the reason for the stockpiling of food which has gone on apace during the past year? In time of war when


shipping is short it is a good thing that stocks should be built up, because it is not always the case that shipping is available. Stocks in this country today are much higher than was customary before the war. Because of the amount of these stocks we are using refrigerated ships as static stores, and in consequence we have not been able to lift all the meat available for us in the Argentine and in Uruguay. Denmark has been asked to withhold supplies of bacon and our cold stores are cluttered up with New Zealand and Australian frozen rabbits and hares and Polish geese, which are virtually unsaleable at the present time.
In the short time which I have available tonight I want to concentrate on the Supplementary Estimate on Trading Services in respect of the meat and livestock division, where the increase has been of the order of 55 per cent. above the estimated amount.
Before the war 95 per cent. of our supplies of beef from South America came in the form of that most nutritious and edible food, chilled beef. In that case it went straight—

Mr. Keenan: Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that 95 per cent. of the meat imported before the war was chilled?

Mr. Thornton-Kemsley: If the hon. Gentleman had listened to me he would have heard that I said that before the war 95 per cent. of our imports of beef from South America came in the form of chilled beef. That is a fact; the hon. Member may shake his head but it makes no difference to that fact. That beef went straight into consumption. The balance of the stocks that were imported and were not held by the meat works overseas, were fairly evenly spread along the pipeline between producer and consumer.
Contrast that with the position today. Privately owned cold stores at the ports are filled to capacity, and the remote inland stores owned by the Government and strategically placed as an insurance against bombing during the war are filled too. Fifteen refrigerator ships have been pressed into service at a cost of no less than £250,000 in respect of storage charges over and above the cost of storing

on land. That is saying nothing whatever of the high cost of the double handling and extra transportation involved. This seems to me to be a very expensive way of doing things.
What is the object? It cannot be to strenghten our bargaining power since the bargains were already struck before this storage fetish reached its height. The Committee should examine some of these bargains for a moment, because an understanding of our monetary commitments is essential if we are to see why the original Estimates have been so grossly miscalculated. We are concerned here with three Argentine Agreements which for the sake of brevity I will refer to by their trade names—Bulk Purchase Number 7, Bulk Purchase Number 8, which is the Andes Agreement, and Bulk Purchase Number 9, which is the 1949 Anglo-Argentine Agreement. The shipments under Bulk Purchase Number 8 were 70,000 tons short. In June of last year Bulk Purchase Number 9 was signed. Like its predecessors it suffered from the fact that it was negotiated not by experts but by diplomatic and permanent officials. The price under Bulk Purchase Number 9 was 33¼ per cent. in advance of the price under Bulk Purchase Number 8. Later, this price was made retrospective to 1st April, 1949. That is an appropriate date, since we have to pay an increased price for the 70,000 tons, due under Bulk Purchase Number 8, but actually delivered to us under Bulk Purchase Number 9 terms. That piece of folly cost us £1.3 million.
Other imported meat from the Dominions—Australia and New Zealand—has gone up in price, too, during the current financial year. I can give the figures, but I want, at this late hour, to keep my speech as brief as I possibly can. All these figures are at the pre-devaluation rate. What is to happen after that? That matter is under discussion at Buenos Aires at the present time—I am speaking now mainly of meat from Argentina—between the commercial Minister at the British Embassy, a gentleman who rejoices appropriately in the name of Mr. Joint, and the Argentine Government. Under the Anglo-Argentina Agreement, 1949, Bulk Purchase Number 9, the basic price of £97 5s. per long ton was agreed for the first year of the five-year contract. What has not been


fixed is the rate of exchange at which this basic price is to be paid.
In respect of all shipments between 18th September last and 17th January this year we have had to credit Argentina through our joint clearings with sufficient sterling to offset the degree of devaluation of the £. It is very doubtful whether Mr. Joint will be able to do any better than that in his discussions, and I think we shall have, in future contracts, to deposit again sufficient sterling to make up for the degree of devaluation. The pre-devaluation rate of exchange was 13.53 pesos to the £. The post-devaluation rate of exchange is 9.40 to the £, a drop of very nearly 40 per cent. The prices that we pay for Argentine meat have already risen by 62¾ per cent. since the expiry of Bulk Purchase Number 7 in the first quarter of 1948. An addition of a further 40 per cent. in respect of devaluation will mean that the price of Argentine meat will have doubled in two years. I wonder whether the Committee realise the seriousness of the implication of a statement like that, the doubling in price of a large amount of our imported meat in two years.
Let me give one example. Before the war, Argentine chiller quality beef in chilled condition would sell at Smithfield Market at 5½d. 1b. Before devaluation, the same meat, but frozen and much less palatable, was costing 1s. 0½d. per 1b., whereas, at the post-devaluation rate it has cost 1s. 5d. Even so, the rise in meat prices is cushioned by a subsidy of £50 million which is included in the food subsidies, which are now running at the Chancellor's limit of £465 million a year. To reduce stocks by increasing rations, which I have no doubt is what the Minister would like to do, would mean either increasing the subsidy or allowing the price of food to rise.
I should like in rather lighter vein to call attention to a gross piece of bad administration which is responsible in some degree for the rise in these Supplementary Estimates. I want to talk about frozen imported rabbits, hares and geese, to which I have already made a brief reference. There are in store at present over 500,000 60-lb. crates of frozen Australian rabbits which have been brought into the country by the Ministry of Food and are a sufficient supply for 12 months. Because these rabbits are

practically unsaleable, since last Chrismas the prices have been cut by 40 per cent. I am told by someone who has seen them recently that they are already mouldering and perishing.
This is a perfect example of the rigidity of the official mind. Someone in the Ministry made up his mind that a 10 weeks' stock was the proper reserve to hold in respect of these frozen rabbits. Distribution was therefore fixed at roundabout 30,000 crates a week. Last summer stocks rose to above the 500,000 level, yet the output was still fixed at around 30,000 crates a week. If the advice of the trade had been taken—it never was taken during the regime of the late Minister—stocks could have been cleared when the meat ration was down to 10d. and when bacon was in short supply, for I am told that at that time crates of these imported rabbits were selling on the black market at a premium of £2 a crate. Instead of listening to the advice of the experts, the Ministry of Food officials, worrying their bureaucratic heads about the question of replacement, lost a great chance of selling out at a moderate price. Now the loss on this item alone is unlikely to be less than £1 million.
Frozen Australian hares provide another example. Over 300,000 of them are in stock. Including storage, they cost about 7s. each. They could have been sold to Germany last year at 6s. a hare, but the late Minister, who had lost so much on his sale of Algerian wine that he was frightened of producing any further losses, refused to allow the sale. These hares are now unsaleable at 2s. 6d. each, so his unfortunate successor has been saddled with a loss in the region of £100,000 in respect of this item. There is very much the same story in the case of Polish geese. The Government could have bought high grade turkeys at rather less than the price at which they chose instead to go on a wild goose chase to Poland. They imported thousands of crates of frozen geese which they can now only sell at a loss which would be catastrophic to a private trader.
Such are the follies of the planners. What is the moral of all this? It is that if losses of this kind are to be avoided in future we should do what the Select Committee on Estimates, a body in the last Parliament of which 22 out of the


35 members were Socialists, recommended in its 13th Report. It said:
There is in the present system"—
That is, of the importation and distribution of meat—
room for economy. The present machinery of procurement and distribution should be overhauled.
We should make a start now with handing back the trade to the experts. Government trading in the procurement of food wastes the money of the taxpayer, it produces less and poorer meat, and the housewife has to take what she is offered or go without. It took many months to prepare for D Day; let us start preparing now for decontrol.

9.11 p.m.

The Minister of Food (Mr. Maurice Webb): I must begin my first speech from the Box by thanking the hon. Member for Angus, North, and Mearns (Mr. Thornton-Kemsley) for the kind words he said about my arrival in this rather hot seat at the Ministry of Food. I wish he could have found it in his heart to support his kind words by kind acts and let me have my Supplementary Estimate, but apparently his kindness must be confined to words. However, I am grateful for the sincere things he said, and I hope that at least he will refrain from dividing on this Vote and let me have my Estimate.
The hon. Member put his views in a moderate way and I have no complaint to make, except that I regret what he said about my predecessor. I want to make it quite clear to the Committee and to the public that if ever I am able in the next few months to relieve the burden of people in this country, it will be largely because of the excellent work done by my predecessor. [HON. MEMBERS: "Nonsense."] I am not seeking the cheers of the other side, I am saying quite sincerely what I think and know, and in this post the Secretary of State for War did many excellent things. If I and the public can reap the benefit from them, I shall be grateful, but I want the credit to go to the right place.
To come straight to the issues of this matter we are discussing, I am afraid that many of the questions raised by the hon. Gentleman are not really relevant to the Supplementary Estimate, and we must keep to that. Before I consider

the criticisms he made, however, I want to deal with one or two general considerations. The Committee must judge this Estimate against the scale of our operations. It is an Estimate for £13 million odd. After all we are a trading Department and the ordinary tests of probity and of efficiency and of management in Government Departments cannot be applied in quite the same way to the Ministry of Food. We are engaged, in association with private business, in buying and distributing food for 50 million people. Therefore, in judging the efficiency of our work and the effectiveness of our estimates, we must take into account some other standards.
So I want to remind the Committee that our turnover last year was no less a sum than £1,628 million and hon. Members must judge this figure of £13 million against that background in order to get it in the right proportion. Then, being a trading Department, it is obviously not possible for us to estimate ahead with the precision of other Departments, because we are dealing with all sorts of speculative matters—of harvests and of demands and changes in tastes and things of that kind—and it is not always possible to foresee trading possibilities. For example, a few days ago we effected an admirable arrangement in Washington that will bring to this country at a good price a large quantity of dried eggs.

Mr. Stanley: Are those the ones which the City of New York refused to take as a free gift?

Mr. Webb: No, these are the ones which the bakers and the confectioners of this country are very glad to have, and we got them at a very good price. Nobody could have foreseen, in preparing the estimates of our trading operations for this year that those dried eggs would have been available. That is the kind of problem which arises in a trading Department, and any business man on the other side of the Committee will recognise that we cannot estimate and assume that things of that kind are going to happen.
It would be wholly wrong of us, however, to miss the opportunity of getting things of that kind for the people of this country merely because of anxiety about having to introduce a Supplementary. Estimate. A trading Department, I


should think any businessman would agree, must be flexible in order to succeed in its work. In the light of that situation, surely it is not unreasonable for us to come before the Committee and say that we want this money in order to accumulate more stocks in the light of favourable circumstances which have arisen, in order to help us to feed our people better than they were fed before.
This Supplementary Estimate represents no more than a process of stocking up, of stock-piling, of putting on one side the things that we have been able to find available. We want to get them here at a good price, and we have been able to do it. They are assets. The money has not been wasted. It is not a matter of bad management or of inefficiency in the Department. It is merely a matter of having paid bills for certain foods which we want and which we are glad to have. In the short time I have been in this Department, I am agreeably surprised to find such a high degree of accuracy in estimating our cash needs in these conditions. But whilst assuring the Committee and the taxpayer that this sum of money is not required to cover improvident spending, it is obviously an obligation for me to try to explain to the Committee why it has become necessary.
The hon. Member for Angus, North and Mearns called attention to our negotiations with the Argentine. He called it a "storage fetish." I was really surprised to hear him say things like that. I should have thought he would have wanted to support us in the efforts we are going to try to make to show the Argentine Government that we are not going to be blackmailed any longer. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] The whole purpose behind this business of building up stocks and of using the vessels to store the meat was to put our negotiator, Mr. Joint, in a stronger position than he would otherwise have been. I should have thought that was a matter of good business, that every step the Department took to enable us to negotiate from a position of strength, and not from a position of weakness, was a good thing. That is precisely what we have been doing.
We want now to say frankly to the Argentine Government that we are now in a position where we want to get from them such meat as they can supply and we want, at a fair price, and no more.
We want them to understand we are now in a position to protect our people by these stores that have been prudently built up by the very process about which the hon. Member complains, and that we are in a position to negotiate on that basis. I make no apology at all for that having happened. I should have thought the whole Committee would have rejoiced that we were now in that position.
A Department like the Ministry of Food must always be searching, not only for greater volume, but for greater variety, and if we are doing that, obviously it must involve a very high degree of speculative risk. I say frankly that in the light of the situation in which I am working, I shall go out as far as I can to take more risks in order to get more variety of food for the people of this country. That might mean on occasion that one will make what is called in the business world a "bad buy"; but that is not a strange thing, it is not confined to Government Departments. Every commercial undertaking, surely, has its chambers of horrors downstairs, with the things its buyers have bought thinking they were good, but which did not turn out to be good in the end. That is a normal commercial risk; it is part of business. If we are to be stopped from doing that kind of thing, then we shall be stopped from giving the ordinary people the variety of food which they ought to have.
So far as I am concerned, I am not prepared to go back on that policy, but to accelerate it. I warn the Committee that it means that on occasion we may have to come to Parliament to defend a mistake, and say, "In this case we bought this because we believed it was a good thing to underwrite the ration and guarantee to our people that they would have the food, but it turned out, in the light of market considerations and other things over which we have no control, to be a mistake." But consider the degree of the mistake against the degree of success in these operations; then we would get it in the right kind of proportion.
That is the essential obligation of the Department and the general answer to the hon. Gentleman. The Ministry of Food are under an obligation to maintain on behalf of this House the guarantee that we give to every citizen that his or


her ration book will be honoured. That is a very big obligation for any Department to carry; and to make sure that we can honour the obligation that when people go to the shops to buy their butter, fats, margarine and the rest the goods will be there, we are compelled to carry rather higher stocks in reserve than otherwise might be the case.
That is part of the situation in which we are now living and working. The situation will inevitably get easier insofar as we can get rid of rationing. That will depend upon factors of supply, although I am bound to say that in the end there are certain elements of rationing policy in this country which I would always want to maintain as essential instruments of fair play and the proper and prudent management of our affairs. But obviously there are certain sides of rationing merely involved in shortages and things of that kind. Until we can get rid of those, the House must enable the Ministry of Food to have behind it adequate reserve stocks at all points so that if anything goes wrong with supplies the Ministry of Food are there with stocks to enable them to honour the rations.
I was as much worried about rabbits as the hon. Member. There they are; I wish they were not there. As a matter of fact, I think the hon. Member exaggerated their condition. [An HON. MEMBER: "Try to sell them."] I ask the Committee to remember what I said earlier, because it is a very serious point. We were bound to face that kind of circumstance now and again in order to make sure—and my Department must always make sure—that the food is there insofar as we can get it and that the people of this country are safeguarded against any anxiety or want. Sometimes we buy things which in the end, because of changes in taste and marketing, are not needed. Now and again that happens and we have to take the risk. I say on behalf of the Department that the total amount of the loss in that operation is almost negligible compared with the success of their general operations. The facts will prove that and in a later Debate, when we deal with the wider obligations and are not limited to this Supplementary Estimate, I hope to give fuller facts about the situation.
In the Ministry of Food we are trying to aim at an extension of freedom of

choice. We want our people to be free to say they will not have things. That is a desirable situation. How can we get to that situation unless we are allowed some flexibility in buying? If the other side are too rigid and tight and critical in their tests of our buying policy, they cannot expect such successful results on this side. We believe, and I believe profoundly, that people are happier when they decide for themselves. I want people to be in an economic position to decide for themselves. As on this side of the Committee we advance in giving people the purchasing power to be able to decide what they want, I want in my job to be able to provide the things they can buy with that money. I hope that I shall have the full co-operation of all sides of the House in that responsibility.

9.25 p.m.

Captain Crookshank: I wish to make just one point. This general sort of argument between the two sides of the House will be continued later in the Session, but tonight we are concerned with a very small point, that of having to find £.15½ million more this year as a result of a net excess of payments over receipts. My hon. Friend pointed out in his speech where he had seen errors made, as he thought, in the purchase and procurement of meat. Had we had the time, other hon. Friends of mine had intended to amplify the point by giving examples in other directions. That we cannot do tonight. The main point to which our attention and the attention of the Committee ought to be directed when dealing with a Supplementary Estimate of this kind, of an excess of payments over receipts in trading services, is: What are the stocks held. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in a Debate a few days ago, in which we first raised this matter, pointed out that the stocks had increased and that was the explanation. We do not know that except for his ipse dixit.
What we ask the Government to do is, in the case of the trading services of the Ministry of Food, to be good enough to do what they do in the case of the trading services of the Board of Trade and the Ministry of Supply, namely, to give full information as to the stocks held. The right hon. Gentleman implies that because we are dealing with the


food of the people, there is some risk in disclosing those facts. What is the difference between disclosing them when it is a matter of the food of the people and in disclosing stocks which are necessary for the employment or the housing of the people? In the case of copper, zinc, tin and other metals information is given, as it is in the case of timber—softwood, hardwood, plywood, etc.—which are required for housing. Does the right hon. Gentleman mean to let us have this information about food? That is the question I want to put to him, and I have left him two minutes in which to reply.

9.28 p.m.

Mr. Webb: I am sorry that I did not deal with that very important point which the hon. Gentleman raised. There are difficulties about this matter, as hon. Members opposite will recognise. Obviously the negotiators in the Argentine would give a lot at this moment to know exactly what our meat stocks are. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] They cannot estimate so accurately. It would be very imprudent rashly to give information of that kind. My general undertaking is that one of the things I want to do is to give the people of this country much

more factual information about how the food supply is going. If that does on some occasions provide the opportunity of giving more information about stocks without any danger to our interests, that information will be given. That is as far as I can go. I must recognise the limitation imposed by the trading requirements of this country. It would be entirely improper to put our negotiators in a weak position by giving away information which other people ought not to have.

9.29 p.m.

Captain Crookshank: I am not asking for specific figures to be given at this moment. I am asking that as a matter of practice these stocks should he published year after year as is the case of stocks of other trading Departments. I understand from the right hon. Gentleman's reply that he does not intend to do this, that he cannot give a firm guarantee that it will be done. As he cannot do so, I shall ask my right hon. and hon. Friends to support the Amendment.

Question put, "That Sub-head H be reduced by £100."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 240; Noes, 288.

Division No. 4.]
AYES
[9.30 p.m.


Aitken, W. T.
Clarke, Col. R. S. (East Grinstead)
Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)


Alport, C. J. M.
Clarke, Brig. T H. (Portsmouth, W.)
Garner-Evans, E. H. (Denbigh)


Amery, J. (Preston, N.)
Clyde, J. L.
Grimston, Hon. J. (St. Albans)


Amory, D. Heathcoat (Tiverton)
Colegate, A.
Grimston, R. V. (Westbury)


Arbuthnot, J. S.
Cooper, A. E. (Ilford, S.)
Hare, Hon. J. H. (Woodbridge)


Ashton, H. (Chelmsford)
Cooper-Key, E. M
Harris, F. W. (Croydon, N.)


Assheton, Rt. Hon. R. (Blackburn, W.)
Corbett, Lieut.-Col. U. (Ludlow)
Harris, R. R. (Heston)


Astor, Hon. M.
Craddock, G. B. (Spelthorne)
Harvey, Air-Codre. A. V. (Macclesfield)


Baker, P.
Cranborne, Viscount
Harvey, I. (Harrow, E.)


Baldock, J. M.
Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. F. C.
Hay, John


Baldwin, A. E.
Cross, Rt. Hon. Sir R
Head, Brig. A. H.


Banks, Col. C.
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Heald, L. F.


Baxter, A. B.
Crowder, F. P. (Northwood)
Heath, Colonel E. G. R.


Beamish, Maj. T. V. H.
Crowder, Capt. John F. E. (F'chley)
Hicks-Beach, Maj. W. W.


Bell, R. M. (S. Buckinghamshire)
Cuthbert, W. N.
Higgs, J. M. C.


Bennett, Sir P. (Edgbaston)
Davidson, Viscountess
Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)


Bennett, R. F. B. (Gosport)
Davies, Nigel (Epping)
Hill, Dr. C. (Luton)


Bennett, W. G. (Woodside)
de Chair, S.
Hogg, Hon. Q.


Bevins, J. R. (Liverpool, Toxteth)
De la Bère, R.
Hollis, M. C.


Bishop, F. P.
Deedes, W. F.
Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)


Black, C. W.
Digby, S. Wingfield
Hope, Lord J.


Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)
Dodds-Parker, A. D.
Hopkinson, H.


Boothby, R.
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord M.
Howard, G. R (St. Ives)


Bosom, A. C.
Drayson, G. B.
Howard, S G. (Cambridgeshire)


Bowen, R.
Drewe, C.
Hudson, Sir A. U. M. (Lewisham, N.)


Bower, N.
Dugdale, Maj. Sir T. (Richmond)
Hudson, W. R. A. (Hull, N.)


Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Dunglass, Lord
Hurd, A. R.


Braine, B.
Duthie, W. S.
Hutchison, Lt.-Com. Clark (E.'b'rgh, W.)


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W.
Elliot, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Walter
Hyde, H. M.


Brooke, H. (Hampstead)
Erroll, F. J.
Hylton-Foster, H. B.


Browne, J. N. (Govan)
Fisher, N. T. L.
Jeffreys, General Sir G.


Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Fletcher, W. (Bury)
Johnson, H. S. (Kemptown)


Bullus, Wing-Commander E. E.
Fort, R.
Jones, A (Hall Green)


Butler, Rt. Hon. R. A. (S'ffr'n W'ld'n)
Fraser, Hon. H. C. P. (Stone)
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.


Carr, L. R. (Mitcham)
Fraser, Sir I. (Lonsdale)
Kaberry, D.


Carson, Hon. E.
Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.
Keeling, E. H.


Channon, H.
Gage, C. H.
Kerr, H. W. (Cambridge)


Churchill, Rt. Hon. W. S.
Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D. (Pollok)
Lambert, Hon. G.




Langford-Holt, J.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H.
Stevens, G. P


Law, Rt. Hon. R. K.
Ormsby-Gore, Hon. W. D.
Steward, W. A. (Woolwich, W.)


Lennox-Boyd, A. T
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
Stewart, J. Henderson (Fife, E.)


Lindsay, Martin
Orr-Ewing, Ian L. (Weston-super-Mare)
Strauss, Henry (Norwich, S.)


Linstead, H. N.
Osborne, C.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. J (Moray)


Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)
Peake, Rt. Hon. O
Summers, G. S


Longden. G. J. M (Harts S.W.)
Perkins, W. R. D.
Sutcliffe, H.


Low, A. R. W.
Pato, Brig. C H. M.
Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)


Lucas, Major Sir J. (Portsmouth S.)
Pickthorn, K
Taylor, W. J. (Bradford, N.)


Lucas, P. B. (Brantford)
Pitman, I J
Teeling, William


Lucas-Tooth, Sir H.
Powell, J. Enoch
Thomas, J. P L (Hereford)


McAdden, S. J.
Prescott, Stanley
Thompson, K. P. (Walton)


McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S.
Price, H. A. (Lewisham, W.)
Thompson, R. H. M. (Croydon, W.)


Macdonald, Sir P. (I. of Wight)
Prior-Palmer, Brig. O
Thorneycroft, G. E. P. (Monmouth)


Mackason, Brig. H. R.
Profumo, J. D.
Thornton-Kemsley, C. N


McKibbin, A.
Rayner, Brig. R.
Thorp, Brigadier R. A[...]


McKie, J. H. (Galloway)
Redmayne, M.
Tilney, J. D.


Maclay, Hon. J. S.
Remnant, Hon. P.
Touche, G. C.


Maclean, F. H. R.
Renton, D. L. M.
Turton, R. H.


MacLeod, I. (Enfield, W.)
Roberts, H. (Handsworth)
Tweedsmuir, Lady


MacLeod, J. (Ross and Cromarty)
Roberts, P. G. (Heeley)
Vane, W. M. F


Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)
Robertson, Sir D. (Caithness)
Vaughan-Morgan, J. K.


Maitland, Comdr. J. W.
Robson-Brown, W.
Vosper, D. F.


Manningham-Buller, R. E
Rodgers, J. (Sevenoaks)
Wakefield, E. B. (Derbyshire, W.)


Morales, A. E.
Roper, Sir H.
Wakefield, Sir W. W. (St. Marylebone)


Marshall, D. (Bodmin)
Ropner, Col. L.
Walker-Smith, D. C.


Marshall, S. H. (Sutton)
Ross, Sir R. D. (Londonderry)
Ward, Hon. G. R. (Worcester)


Maude. A. E. U. (Ealing, S.)
Russell, R. S.
Ward, Miss I. (Tynemouth)


Maude, J. C. (Exeter)
Ryder, Capt. R. E. D.
Watkinson, H.


Maudling, R.
Sandys, RI. Hon. D.
Watt, Sir G. S. Harvie


Medlicott, Brigadier F
Savory, Prof. D L.
Webbe, Sir H. (London)


Mellor, Sir J.
Scott, Donald
Wheatley, Major M. J. (Poole)


Morris, R. Napkin (Carmarthen)
Shepherd, W. S. (Cheadle)
White, J. Baker (Canterbury)


Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)
Smiles, Lt.-Col. Sir W.
Williams, C. (Torquay)


Mott-Radclyfle, C. E.
Smith, E. M. (Grantham)
Williams, Sir H. G. (Croydon, E.)


Nabarro, G.
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)
Wills, G.


Nicholls, H.
Smithers, Sir W. (Orpington)
Wilson, G. (Truro)


Nicholson, G.
Smyth, Brig. G. (Norwood)
Wood, Hon. R.


Nield, B. (Chester)
Soames, Capt. C.
York, C.


Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.
Spearman, A. C. M
Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)


Nugent, G. R. H.
Spens, Sir P. (Kensington, S.)



Nutting, Anthony
Stanley, Rt. Hon. O. (Bristol, W.)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Oakshott, H. D.
Stanley, Capt. Hon. R. (N. Fylde)
Mr. Studholme and Major Conant.




NOES


Acland, Sir Richard
Chetwynd, G. R.
Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)


Adams, Richard
Clunie, J.
Evans, E. (Lowestoft)


Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)
Cobb, F. A.
Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)


Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)
Cocks, F. S.
Ewart, R.


Anderson, A. (Motherwell)
Coldrick, W.
Fernyhough, E.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R
Collick, P.
Field, Capt. W. J.


Awbery, S. S.
Collindridge, F.
Finch, H. J.


Ayles, W. H.
Cook, T. F.
Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)


Bacon, Miss A
Cooper, G. (Middlesbrough, W.)
Follick, M.


Baird, J.
Cooper, J. (Deptford)
Foot, M. M.


Balfour, A.
Corbet, Mrs. F K. (Peckham)
Forman, J. C.


Barnes, Rt. Hon A. J.
Cove, W. G.
Fraser, T. (Hamilton)


Bartley, T.
Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Freeman, J. (Watford)


Bellenger, Rt. Hon F. J.
Crosland, C. A. R.
Freeman, Peter (Newport)


Benson, C.
Grossman, R. H. S.
Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H T N


Beswick, F.
Cullen, Mrs. A.
Ganley, Mrs. C. S


Bevan, Rt. Hon. A. (Ebbw Vale)
Dagger, G.
Gibson, C. W.


Bing, G. H. C.
Daines, P.
Gilzean, A.


Blackburn, A. R.
Darling, G. (Hillsboro')
Glanville, J. E. (Consett)


Blenkinsop, A.
Davies, Edward (Stoke, N.)
Gooch, E. G.


Blyton, W. R.
Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
Gordon-Walker, Rt. Hon P C


Booth, A.
Davies, Harold (Leek)
Greenwood, A W J (Rossendale)


Bottomley, A. G.
Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Greenwood, Rt. Hon A (Wakefield)


Bowden, W.
Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Grey, C. F.


Bowles, F. G. (Nuneaton)
de Freitas, Geoffrey
Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Deer, G.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J (Llanelly)


Brockway, A. Fenner
Delargy, H. J.
Griffiths, W. D. (Exchange)


Brook, D. (Halifax)
Diamond, J.
Gunter, R. J.


Brooks, T. J. (Normanton)
Dodds, N. N.
Haire, John E. (Wycombe)


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Donnelly, D.
Hale, J (Rochdale)


Brown, George (Belper)
Donovan, T. N.
Hale Leslie (Oldham, W.)


Burke, W. A
Driberg, T. E. N.
Hall, J. (Gateshead, W.)


Burton, Miss E.
Dugdale, Rt. Hon. J. (W. Bromwich)
Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil (Colne Valley)


Butler, H. W. (Hackney. S.)
Dye, S.
Hamilton, W. W.


Callaghan, James
Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Hannan, W


Carmichael, James
Edelman, M.
Hardman, D. R


Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Edwards, Rt. Hon. N. (Caerphilly)
Hardy, E. A.


Champion, A. J.
Edwards, W. J. (Stepney)
Hargreaves, A







Harrison, J.
Manuel, A. C.
Simmons, C J


Hastings, Dr. Somerville
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.
Slater, J.


Hayman, F. H.
Mathers, Rt. Hon. George
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)


Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Tipton)
Mellish, R. J.
Smith, H. N. (Nottingham, S.)


Herbison, Miss M.
Messer, F.
Snow, J. W.


Hewitson, Capt. M.
Middleton, Mrs. L
Sorensen, R. W.


Hobson, C. R.
Mikardo, Ian
Stewart, Michael (Fulham. E.)


Holman, P.
Mitchison, G. R.
Stokes, Rt. Hon. R. R.


Holmes, H E. (Hemsworth)
Moeran, E. W
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.


Houghton, Douglas
Monslow, W.
Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R. (Vauxhar)


Hoy, J.
Moody, A. S.
Stross, Dr. B


Hubbard, T.
Morgan, Dr. H B
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. Edith


Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, N.)
Morley, R.
Sylvester, G. O.


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayr)
Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)
Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)


Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Lewisham, S.)
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)


Hughes, R. M. (Islington, N.)
Mort, D. L.
Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)


Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Moyle, A.
Thomas, I. O. (Wrekin)


Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Mulley, F. W.
Thomas, I. R. (Rhondda, W)


Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Murray, J. D
Thomas, T. George (Cardiff)


Irving, W. J. (Wood Green)
Nally, W.
Thorneycroft, Harry (Clayton)


Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A
Neal, H.
Thurtle, Ernest


Janner, B.
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P. J.
Timmons, J.


Jay, D. P. T
O'Brien, T.
Tomlinson, Rt. Hon G


Jeger, G. (Goole)
Oldfield, W. H.
Tomney, F.


Jager, Dr. S. W. (St. Pancras, S.)
Oliver, G. H.
Usborne, Henry


Jenkins, R. H.
Orbach, M.
Vernon, Maj. W F


Johnson, J. (Rugby)
Padley, W. E.
Viant, S. P.


Johnston, Douglas (Paisley)
Paling, Rt. Hn. Wilfred (Deane V'lly)
Wallace, H. W.


Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)
Paling, Will T (Dewsbury)
Watkins, T. E.


Jones, Elwyn (West Ham S.)
Pannell, T. C.
Webb, Rt. Hon. M (Bradford. C.)


Jones, W. E. (Conway)
Pargiter, G. A.
Weitzman, D.


Keenan, W.
Parker, J.
Wells, P. L. (Faversham)


Key, Rt. Hon. C. W
Paton, J.
Wells, W. T. (Walsall)


King, H. M.
Peart, T. F.
West, D. G.


Kinghorn, Sqn.-Ldr. E
Poole, Cecil
Wheatley, Rt. Hon. John (Edinb'gh. E.)


Kinley, J.
Popplewell, E
White, Mrs. E. (E. Flint)


Lang, Rev. G.
Porter, G.
White, H. (Derbyshire, N. E.)


Lee, Miss J. (Cannock)
Price, M. Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)
Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W


Lever, L. M. (Ardwick)
Proctor, W. T.
Wigg, George


Lewis, A. W. J. (West Ham, N.)
Pryde, D. J.
Wilcock, Group-Capt. C. A. B.


Lewis, J. (Bolton, W.)
Pursey, Comdr H.
Wilkes, L.


Lindgren, G. S.
Rankin, J.
Wilkins, W. A.


Lipton, Lt.-Col. M
Rees, Mrs. D.
Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)


Logan, D. G.
Reeves, J.
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Longden, F. (Small Heath)
Reid, T. (Swindon)
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


McAllister, G.
Rhodes, H.
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


MacColl, J. E.
Robens, A.
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


McGhee, H. G.
Roberts, Goronwy (Caertsarvonshire)
Wilson, Rt. Hon. J. H. (Huyton)


McGovern, J.
Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)
Winterbottom, I. (Nottingham, C.)


Mack, J. D.
Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)
Winterbottom, R. E. (Brightside)


McKay, J. (Wallsend)
Rogers, G. H. R. (Kensington, N.)
Wise, Major F. J.


Mackay, R. W. G. (Reading, N.)
Ross, William (Kilmarnock)



McLeavy, F.
Royle, C.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)
Shackleton, E. A. A.
Woods, Rev. G. S.


MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Shawcross, Rt. Hon. Sir H
Wyatt, W. L.


Mainwaring, W. H.
Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E
Yates, V. F.


Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Shurmer, P. L. E.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Silverman, J. (Erdington)



Mann, Mrs. J.
Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:




Mr. Pearson and Mr. Sparks.


Question put, and agreed to.

It being after Half-past Nine o'Clock The CHAIRMAN proceeded, pursuant to the Standing Order No. 16 (Business of Supply) to put the Question necessary to dispose of the Vote then under discussion.

Resolved:
That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £13,880,400, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for the salaries and expenses of the Ministry of Food; the cost of trading services, including certain subsidies; and sundry other services.

The CHAIRMAN then proceeded forthwith to put the Question with respect to all such Army Votes for the coming financial year which had been put down on at least one previous day for consideration in the Committee of Supply on an Allotted Day:

"That the total amounts of all such Votes outstanding be granted for that Service."

ARMY ESTIMATES, 1950–51

"That a sum, not exceeding £137,577,100, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during


the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1951, for expenditure in respect of the Army Services, viz.:—




£


1.
Pay, &amp;c., of the Army
84,630,000


2.
Reserve Forces (to a number not exceeding 35,000 all ranks for the Regular Reserve and 27,000 all ranks for the Supplementary Reserve), Territorial Army (to a number not exceeding 142,000 all ranks of the Territorial Army) and Cadet Forces
11,045,000


8.
Works, Buildings and Lands
25,345,000


10.
Non-effective Services
16,557,000


11.
Additional Married Quarters
100




£137,577,100"

The CHAIRMAN then proceeded in like manner to put severally the Questions,

"That the total amounts of all outstanding Estimates supplementary to those of the current financial year as have been presented seven clear days and of the outstanding Excess Vote, be granted for the Services defined in those Supplementary Estimates, and that Statement of Excess, the Committee of Public Accounts having reported allowing the said Vote."

CIVIL ESTIMATES AND ESTIMATES FOR REVENUE DEPARTMENTS, SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES, 1949–50.

"That a Supplementary sum, not exceeding £133,511,600, be granted to His Majesty, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1950, for expenditure in respect of the following Supplementary Estimates, viz.:—


CIVIL ESTIMATES


CLASS I




£


4.
Treasury and Subordinate Departments
10


13.
The Mint
10


23.
Miscellaneous Expenses
2,500,000


23B.
American Aid Counterpart Funds
300,000





CLASS II




£


4.
United Nations
20,000


6.
Commonwealth Relations Office
19,000


7.
Commonwealth Services
151,510


12.
Development and Welfare (Colonies, &amp; c.)
5,950,000


13.
Development and Welfare (South African High Commission Territories)
59,400


CLASS III


3.
Police, England and Wales
592,000


5.
Child Care, England and Wales
123,000


7.
Supreme Court of Judicature, &amp; c.
10


12.
Miscellaneous Legal Expenses
10


14.
Police, Scotland
54,540


CLASS IV


1.
Ministry of Education
10


2.
British Museum
10,000


10.
Grants for Science and the Arts
10


13.
Festival of Britain, 1951
174,000


14.
Public Education, Scotland
10


CLASS V


2.
National Health Service, England and Wales
89,400,000


7.
Ministry of National Insurance
1,605,000


11.
Ministry of Town and Country Planning
10


13.
Department of Health for Scotland
10


14.
National Health Service, Scotland
9,330,000


CLASS VI


1.
Board of Trade
10


9.
Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (Food Production Services)
2,600,000


CLASS VII


4.
Public Buildings Overseas
175,000


7.
Miscellaneous Works Services
10


8.
Rates on Government Property
10


CLASS VIII


2.
Ministry of Pensions
1,100,000


4.
Superannuation and Retired Allowances
650,000


CLASS IX


1.
Ministry of Supply
16,000,000


6.
Administration of Certain African Territories
10


7.
Advances to Allies, &amp; c
600,000


REVENUE DEPARTMENTS.


1.
Customs and Excise
98,000


2.
Inland Revenue
10


3.
Post Office
2,000,000




£133,511,600"

CIVIL (Excess), 1948–49

"That a sum, not exceeding £611 1s. 5d., be granted to His Majesty, to make good an excess on the grant for Osborne for the year ended on the 31st day of March, 1949.

Class and Vote
Excess of Expenditure over Estimate
Appropriations in Aid
Excess Vote


Class VII
£
s.
d.
£
s.
d.
£
s.
d.


5. Osborne
1,515
9
0
904
7
7
611
1
5


Total, Civil (Excess)
£611
1
5"

Resolutions to be reported Tomorrow o Committee to sit again Tomorrow.

WAYS AND MEANS

Considered in Committee.

[Major MILNER in the Chair]

Resolved:
That, towards making good the Supply granted to His Majesty for the service of the year ended on 31st day of March, 2949, the sum of £611 1s. 5d. be granted out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom.

Resolved:
That, towards making good the Supply granted to His Majesty for the service of the year ending on 31st day of March, 1950, the sum of £148,402,375 be granted out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom.

Resolved:
That, towards making good the Supply granted to His Majesty for the service of the year ending on 31st day of March, 1951, the sum of £1,246,213,100 be granted out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom."—[Mr. Douglas Jay.]

Resolutions to be reported Tomorrow; Committee to sit again Tomorrow.

MEMBERS' FUND

Lieut.-Colonel Boles, Mr. Bowles, Colonel Clarke, Mr. Clement Davies, Colonel Sir Charles MacAndrew and Mr. Viant appointed Managing Trustees of the House of Commons Members' Fund in pursuance of Section two of the House of Commons Members' Fund Act, 1939.—[Mr. Popplewell.]

POLES, LUDFORD (FOOD REGISTRATIONS)

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Popplewell.]

9.48 p.m.

Mr. Osborne: I am very grateful to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, and also to Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to change the subject that I want to bring before the House tonight. I had hoped to have brought up some aspects of the National Savings Movement, and I still hope to bring that matter forward later on. However, my constituents ask me to raise as a matter of urgency a grievance of which, I think, this House ought to hear, and I hope that the right hon. Lady will reply to it.
In my constituency there is a village, Ludford, in which 500 Poles have been living for the past four and a half years. They are living in an old R.A.F. camp, and they have been getting ready for British citizenship now for some time past. I was asked to go up there on Monday, and and I spent the whole of the afternoon going round the camp seeing the Poles, and seeing the business people, upon whose behalf I wish to put their case. This village camp, as the right hon. Lady knows, is administered by her Department, and the National Assistance Board.
At the beginning of this year these Poles were told that they were to get ready to acquire British citizenship and that the first step towards that would be the issue of ration books. Then instead of being fed on a communal basis they would be like any other ordinary British citizen and would have to look after their own rations. The Poles, so far as I can tell, are welcoming this step forward, and I am sure that it is a good thing. The complaint that I have to make on behalf of my constituents is that when it came to the point of issuing the ration books at the beginning of this month, advantages were given to the Co-operative Society to secure these registrations, which were denied to the local traders. That is the point and pith of my protest and I wish to give details.
I am not criticising the Co-operative Society as such. All I am criticising is


that they should have been given advantages and privileges which my constituents, as ordinary traders, were denied. If I can establish that, I am sure that I shall have even some hon. Members opposite with me. In January of this year, the Poles were given a series of lectures on British citizenship by a Mr. Gulc, an English-speaking Pole. I am told that from the beginning of January to the end of February his lectures were largely on the advantages of joining the Co-operative movement.—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."]—I shall welcome those "hear, hears" in a minute because they will support my case. He stressed what he considered to be the advantages of joining the Co-operative Society, and, as one of the Poles said to me, he continually dangled the "divi." in front of them. He did not go so far as Gracie Fields in her famous song and say, "You must shop at the Co-op.", but he went pretty near to it.
The complaint of my constituents is that they, as ordinary taxpayers, are having to pay to maintain this man who is advocating a form of trading which would take their living from them. My point is that there is no Co-op. shop nearer to this village than six miles. It was known in the village some weeks ago that ration books would be issued, but the exact date of issue was not known. Many of the Poles who had been getting their extra rations from the ordinary shops in the village naturally went to the people with whom they had traded before, and said, "We will promise you our registration when the time comes," but the local traders were not advised when that time would be.
On 3rd and 4th March—I should like the right hon. Lady to note these dates—these ration books were issued to these 500 Poles at Ludford in my constituency and by a strange coincidence—and this is my point—on the day, at the very hour, they were issued there were three representatives of the Lincoln Co-op. Society in the hut where they were issued. My constituents who have shops only a stone's throw away were not told anything about it. I have been told by certain people on the spot that it showed an intelligent anticipation on the part of the CO-op. Society. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] It is nice to know that some sections of the Socialist Party can

at times show intelligent anticipation; it is not often that we see it. I want to prove to the House that there was a good deal more than that. They were there the whole day on their own, and they secured between 200 and 300 registrations before the local people even knew that these books were going to be issued.
I put it to hon. Members opposite that that is not fair to our ordinary constituents, and I am protesting about it. Furthermore, the nearest Co-op. shop is at Market Rasen, five and a half to six miles away, and it is by no means the biggest or the best shop, even in that small town. Therefore, if these people were going to register at the biggest or the best shop in the locality, they certainly would not have gone to the Co-op., unless they had gone to Lincoln some 25 miles away.
The questions I put to the right hon. Lady are these. How did the Co-op. know that these books were to be issued at this exact time? Who advised them?—because they were advised. On whose authority were they advised? The local grocers complain, and complain rightly, that they should have been told at the same time, and should have had as fair a chance of getting registrations as did the Co-op. The right hon. Lady's Department was represented by one of her officers from London, who had come down to see that the registrations took place properly. A Mr. J. Q. Evans of the Assistance Board, London, came down, so it is the responsibility of the right hon. Lady.
I am making a protest on behalf of the little shopkeepers of my constituency that they have not been given a fair deal. Hon. Members opposite will undoubtedly say that some of these Poles were members of the Co-op. before they came to this country, but for the past four and a half years the Lincoln Co-op. have done nothing for their Co-operative brethren—not one thing: they left it to the private traders, the little people in the village shops, to look after them. But as soon as ever a real plum comes along, one arm of the Socialist Party helps the other arm of the Socialist Party under the big umbrella of the State in order to get an advantage. [Laughter.] Hon. Members opposite may think that is funny, but I think it is a dastardly thing to do.
I went up to my constituency, saw the people concerned, and this is what I was


told. Mrs. Jones, who keeps the post office told me—[Laughter.] This is the evidence I bring to the House. Hon. Members may think it is something to laugh about, but it is both my duty and their duty to see that our constituents get a fair deal. It is no laughing matter when men protest that they are being treated unjustly. She said that this Mr. Gulc began his lectures on the Co-operative system in January. He said that the Co-operative way of trading was the best. He is entitled to say that, and I do not complain of that. But when the ration books were ready to be issued he advised only the Co-op. Society in Market Rasen, and the local people were ignored. I am sure that no hon. Member would say that that is fair, or would try to justify that procedure.
I questioned the education officer, a gentleman with the name of Kawecki, and he confirmed to me that lectures had been given to the Poles for two months, on and off, on the Co-op. system. I also saw the camp padre, whose name I will not attempt to pronounce, and he again said that these lectures had been given over a period of weeks, at which they were told what a good thing it would be, and what a great advantage it would be to these Poles to join the Co-op., ignoring the local people.
I got in touch with Mr. Spring, the chief food officer at Grimsby, who said this to me:
This has worried me very much because of what I have heard. Right at the beginning I was asked to go over and explain the method of rationing and registration, which I did through an interpreter. I took great pains during my lecture to stress the fact that registration"—

It being Ten o'Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Bowden.]

Mr. Osborne: As I was saying, the food officer at Grimsby said:
I took great pains during my lecture to stress the fact that registration could be done with any trader. But it is difficult to put this over through an interpreter.
I am convinced that the food office at Grimsby are in no way responsible for this treatment. The responsibility lies with the Department. The camp manager

is quite a different kettle of fish. His name is quite an English one—Joyce. He states:
No special opportunities were afforded to anyone, the Co-op, or anyone else.
That is not true, because it is admitted that the first time when the flush of registrations took place it was only the Co-op. that had three men there—the other people were not given a chance. If the manager did not know what was going on, he ought to have known, in order to hold his job. He is a servant of the Department and must take responsibility for what he has been doing.
I challenged the Co-op. manager at Market Rasen that he had got 300 out of the 500 registrations, and he said: "Not 300, but something over 200." I say that until this piece of rigging by the party opposite took place there were not half-a-dozen Co-op. supporters in the whole village. It is quite clear to me, therefore, that undue advantage has been given to the Co-operative Society, advantages that were denied to the ordinary small traders. That is what I am protesting about.
A farmer, Mr. F. T. Martin, who lives at "White House," has been supplying a large part of the milk to this camp for about four years. Suddenly the contract was taken from him. He is given no chance to get registrations, but is told that the milk is to be brought from miles away into this village, right past his own farm with all the petrol and labour involved, and that his milk, under this wonderful planning, must be taken miles elsewhere to be sold to other customers. He is, quite naturally, angry over the treatment he is receiving.
A coal merchant in the district, Mr. Cooper of Parsons Bros., told me that the Co-op. were breaking a gentlemen's agreement which had been entered into by engaging a Polish girl to go round this camp to get coal registrations. They have got all but six of the 200 registrations. I say that there has been no fair dealing as between the Co-op. and the ordinary private traders. It is a scandal, and if Members opposite are prepared to laugh and jeer at scandalous behaviour like this, then it is time someone else was facing us.
If a normal trader wants to open a new shop, he has to go to the Government Departments and prove that there is a consumer need. He has to prove that


supplies cannot be made available through existing organisations. Why has not that principle been applied to the Co-operative Society? Why should the Co-operative Society be a privileged society? Do not forget that the nearest Co-op. shop is 5½ miles away. They have now applied for permission to open a shop in the camp. I want to know whether that application is to be granted, and if so, why? If it is to be granted, it violates the very principles the Government have laid down which affect and control the activities of ordinary private traders. That is completely unfair, and I protest against it.
I want to make this point also. The local traders have asked me to protest in the strongest terms, and it will not be very nice for me to go back and say to them, "I have done my best on your behalf, as is the duty of a Member of Parliament to his constituents, but all I met with was jeers and catcalls from those supporting the Government." The Socialists have no interest in the rights of individual persons. All they are concerned about are the trade unions, on the one hand, and the privileged Co-operative Society on the other.
This is the danger which I want to put to the right hon. Lady. She may think it far-fetched, but I do not think so. In two years' time these Poles are going to be entitled to full British citizenship, which means they are going to have a vote. That is quite right and proper, because they are doing a good job on the farms and in the canning factories. Will the same principle apply to them politically as is being applied commercially here? Will this Government if they are still in power—[HON. MEMBERS: "They will not be."]—they might be, and if they are still in power, will they, out of public funds, send down a Socialist lecturer to persons like these, telling them to vote Socialist and denying the right of the other side to put their case? If that is so, we are facing the worst form of Tammany Hall corruption ever seen in this country.
I am protesting against it. It is not so far-fetched as hon. Members opposite seem to think. In "The Times" this morning, the Labour correspondent writes:

The National Committee of the Co-operative Society is expected to move an emergency resolution in support of the Labour Government at the party annual conference at Great Yarmouth at Easter.
That is fair; and then he makes this point:
The main intention of the resolution appears to be to secure a vote of confidence in Labour policy.
That is quite fair. I do not complain of that, but what I do complain of is that public funds, contributed by this side of the House as much as by hon. Members on the other side, have been used to send a Socialist-minded man down to this place so that the Socialist point of view and Socialist privilege can be put forward for another wing of the Socialist Party. Hon. Members may still think it is funny, but I do not. It is a scandal, and in the name of my constituents I am protesting. I hope I get a reasonable reply.

10.4 p.m.

Mr. Deer: I had better declare my interest in this matter, because I happen to be a member of the Co-operative Society that has been attacked. I have never heard a greater distortion of the facts than that which has come from the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne), and I feel sure that when he has heard the real facts he will revise his views about the matter.

Mr. Osborne: I was not attacking the Co-operative Society. I was attacking the privilege that has been extended to them under the aegis of this Government.

Mr. Deer: If I understood the hon. Gentleman correctly, he was attacking the Society for preferential treatment which he said the Government had given it to take advantage of certain circumstances that private traders were not allowed to use. He also said that the Cooperative movement was "tipped off" with some private information which local traders did not possess. How can that happen when the people have not only to register for groceries but also for meat? The Co-operative Society there left the meat position to the private traders, because it had not the mobile shop to deal with it as it did with groceries. To suggest that this was something done under the counter or outside the normal trade arrangement, seems all


eyewash, in view of the fact that village butchers got the registrations.
After all, the Co-operative Society have a shop six and half miles away. I should like to draw attention to the fact that it is because of unfair preference against Co-ops. that the Co-operative Society have had to arrange the system of mobile shops going to Co-operative customers, in places where the local authorities will not give permission for Co-op. shops to be put up. There are housing estates in Lincolnshire where no Co-operative Society is allowed.

Mr. Osborne: Is the hon. Gentleman telling the House that local authorities have ever refused to Co-operatives the right to build a shop in Ludford? If not, he should withdraw what he has said.

Mr. Deer: I said in Lincolnshire. I could give the hon. Gentleman the names of housing estates where permission has been refused on the ground that all the shops had been allocated to small local traders?

Mr. Osborne: In Ludford?

Mr. Deer: No, not in Ludford. It is admitted that only 50 per cent. of the registrations went to the Co-operative Society. Therefore there was free choice for the remaining 50 per cent. Two private traders in Ludford, namely Mr. Lee and Mr. Gibson, who own shops, have stated that they are perfectly satisfied, and there is only one Tory shopkeeper who is not satisfied. The hon. Gentleman complained tonight about preferential treatment. I suggest that the Co-operative Society have nothing to be ashamed of in that they got those registrations. The customers can change them in eight weeks if they are not satisfied. If there is preference, it has been given to private traders. It is the Co-operative Society that has suffered, not the private traders.

The Minister of National Insurance (Dr. Edith Summerskill): There have been other occasions when the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. Osborne) has raised matters on the Adjournment and, in his characteristic, impetuous manner has levelled wild and baseless charges which, after the Adjournment, he has regretted.

Mr. Osborne: Tell me one.

Dr. Summerskill: If the hon. Member looks up HANSARD during the last 4½ years he will find that I have on occasions said to him, when I represented the Ministry of Food, that if he had come to me on the question at issue, and asked me for the facts before he had put his Question down or raised the matter on the Adjournment, I should have been able to reassure him. Tonight—

Mr. Osborne: rose—

Dr. Summerskill: The hon. Gentleman has had 20 minutes for his speech, and I have only a quarter of an hour. I wanted to give him plenty of time to put his case. He must not feel aggrieved when hon. Members on this side of the House enjoy a little laughter at his expense. He must have felt that some of the charges he made tonight were quite unfounded.

Mr. Osborne: They are not.

Dr. Summerskill: I shall prove to him that they are. If on that Monday afternoon which he spent among the Poles he had devoted a little more time to going to people in authority, he would not have come here tonight and made, if I may say so without disrespect, such an unfortunate exhibition of himself. I would remind him that under the Polish Resettlement Act, 1947, the National Assistance Board administered 25 hostels in this country. They have in the past supplied these Poles with food and accommodation, and those men and women who were in employment paid an inclusive charge for their board and accommodation. Many of them now, quite naturally, have said the time has come when they would like to cater for themselves, but they would like to pay the Board for their living quarters. We who are anxious to make these people as comfortable as possible, have agreed that that would be an excellent idea.
Therefore it was decided that ration books should be distributed to them, and on 2nd March arrangements were made for the residents to register with suppliers. The Board's officers were informed that they should, of course, make no approach to traders of any kind, and the warden of the hostel went to see the food executive officer and explained the matter. Subsequently he went to see the secretary of the chamber of commerce at Louth, in the hon. Member's constituency. Perhaps


the hon. Member will go and confirm what I am telling him now. He asked the secretary of the chamber of commerce what procedure should be followed, and the secretary agreed to get in touch with the traders in the district to notify them of the potential consumers in the hostel and to attend on a certain date.

Mr. Osborne: rose—

Dr. Summerskill: The hon. Member has had his say. Let him listen to the facts. These are the facts. I am not going to give way.

Mr. Osborne: There is not a chamber of commerce in Louth.

Dr. Summerskill: Again the hon. Member is displaying ignorance about matters which he should know. This was done. The traders were informed, and on 2nd March eight of them attended at the hostel. They included the manager of the Market Rasen branch of the Lincoln Co-operative Society. So far as I can ascertain, about 202 people registered for groceries with the Co-op., 95 registered with Mr. Gibb, grocer, a private trader, 65 registered with Mr. Lee, a private trader, and 30 registered with Mrs. Jones. In other words, 202 registered with the Co-op. and 190 with private traders. I, who have served for four and a half years at the Ministry of Food, say that that ratio between Co-op. and private traders in a community of this kind where the wages are not very high is quite a usual one.
A complaint was made by Mrs. Jones, who as the hon. Member has rightly described, keeps the little post office-grocery-general shop, where, obviously, her trade is very limited. Hon. Members can envisage Mrs. Jones's little shop. Mrs. Jones came to the hostel with the other traders. The hon. Gentleman alleges that none of them were known. Mrs. Jones alleges that the education officer had been bringing pressure upon the Poles to register with the private
traders.[HON. MEMBERS: "The Co-op."] I apologise. I meant "with the Co-op."

Mr. Osborne: Get the facts right.

Dr. Summerskill: The teacher in question is employed by the education committee, which is an agent of the Ministry

of Education, and, of course, when Mrs. Jones made this complaint, inquiries were made and the teacher categorically denied that he had gone around among the Poles telling them to register with the Co-op. It is interesting that no other trader has complained—

Mr. Osborne: But they have; I have the evidence here.

Dr. Summerskill: —and Mrs. Jones, having complained, after all the registrations had been made, said she was quite satisfied and that she had as many registrations as she could cope with.

Mr. Osborne: Mr. Osborne indicated dissent.

Dr. Summerskill: I have already described what accommodation Mrs. Jones has. Her tiny shop had 30 registrations and she said she was satisfied and that was all she could cope with.

Mr. Osborne: But it is not true.

Dr. Summerskill: The hon. Gentleman must remember that he is talking as though these Poles have come over to this country last week and know nothing about our institutions. They have been here for some years. They have been working in the district, they know Mrs. Jones's shop, all the other shops, and the Co-op., and they were in a position to know what they were doing. As far as I can see, the officers of the Board acted throughout with strict impartiality—

Mr. Osborne: Rubbish.

Dr. Summerskill: —and I am quite satisfied that they have done so. The hon. Gentleman emphasises the importance of these lectures on co-operation. I cannot say how many lectures on cooperation this teacher has given during the last few years. He is there not only to teach these men English but to tell them something about the institutions of this country. I have not inquired as to the nature of all these lectures, but I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman has betrayed an ignorance of business institutions in Poland. At Question Time we are accustomed to the hon. Gentleman getting up from the back bench and telling this House how much he knows of the business of the world, how he goes to the United States and the Continent. We thank him for doing business


for this country but he has displayed tonight a great ignorance of the business methods in Poland before the war. Does he know that the co-operative principle was applied to activities of all kinds in Poland? There were consumer co-operatives, industrial co-operatives—

Mr. Osborne: That is not my point.

Dr. Summerskill: —bank co-operatives. They even had co-operatives for the building of apartments. Furthermore, and this is an important point, the co-operative movement in Poland was never linked to any party.

Mr. Osborne: Jolly good. There is nothing to complain about in that.

Dr. Summerskill: The right wing political parties in Poland and the left wing parties were equally in favour of cooperation, so far in favour of it indeed, that the taxation system in that country favoured co-operative enterprise. Again, 80 per cent. of the arable land in Poland was in the hands of smallholders who, of course, enjoyed co-operative enterprises. Is it any wonder, with that background, that this Pole takes as the subject of his lecture, co-operation in this country?

Mr. Osborne: Just before the registrations.

Dr. Summerskill: We are told by the hon. Member that this Pole—a man, I am told, of the greatest integrity, chosen carefully—lectured on co-operation last year in the hostel—

Mr. Osborne: This year.

Dr. Summerskill: —in order to direct these little registrations from Mrs. Jones to the Co-operative Society. Tonight I feel that the hon. Gentleman is underestimating the intelligence even of his own side. Furthermore, I have other evidence to show the House that this charge is completely unwarranted.

Mr. Osborne: It is not.

Dr. Summerskill: I have already said that the hostels—not all of them, but some of them—are now managed in a different way and that people are allowed to register with certain shops and to conduct their own housekeeping. Two of the hostels, at Kelverdon and Dodding-

ton, have this system in operation and in both these cases we, of course, allow the Poles to choose whom they like. It was asked if the local shopkeeper who was concerned could have a room in the hostel as a shop in order to provide facilities for the occupants. We said, "Yes Choose the people who have the biggest number of registrations." I looked up this matter this morning and I find that in the Kelverdon hostel the biggest number of registrations was with the Co-op. but that in the Doddington hostel the biggest number of registrations was with the private trader.

Mr. Osborne: That is not my point.

Dr. Summerskill: We therefore said to the Co-op, "All right, come in and use a room." We said to the private trader at Doddington, "Come in and use a room." The hon. Member for Louth asks what we shall do if we are asked in this case. We shall consider the matter in the same way as we have considered the position in Kelverdon and Doddington and, probably, give them the same accommodation.
I think I have proved that the case put by the hon. Gentleman tonight is completely without substance, that he has come here in his characteristic impetuous manner, without facts, without figures. He has come, I am very sorry to say, and, having gone to one of the officers of the Ministry of Food, publicly quotes in this House what an official has said to him privately. He should know the ethics of this place, that if an officer in one of the Ministries has a confidential discussion with a Member, the Member should regard that confidence as sacred.

Mr. Osborne: rose—

Dr. Summerskill: The hon. Member must recognise that tonight he has put that official, an important official, the whole House will agree, a food executive officer, in an invidious position. He is now suspect by a certain number of people because the hon. Member says that privately he has criticised the Co-operative institution. But that means nothing to the hon. Member. He wants to come here and make a speech of the type we have heard tonight, irrespective of how he may hurt or ruin individuals

Mr. Osborne: Nonsense.

Dr. Summerskill: The whole House knows that we have listened tonight to strong language and that we have been charged with abusing our position. These officials are unable to come to this House and speak for themselves. Therefore, Ministers on this bench who have to reply should try to defend them. The hon. Gentleman knows that tonight officials both in this Department, in the hostel, and in my Department, the Ministry of National Insurance, have had a certain stigma placed upon them, and I want the House to realise that there was absolutely

no basis or foundation whatever for these charges.

Mr. Osborne: The right hon. Lady has not answered the question I put to her. I have asked her to substantiate that three men were put there—

The Question having been proposed at Ten o'Clock and the Debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at Half-past Ten o'Clock.